Unions Across the Globe Develop, Defend Democracy

Unions Across the Globe Develop, Defend Democracy

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Unions Across the Globe Develop, Defend Democracy
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As the world witnesses some of the greatest challenges to democratic governments since the 1930s, unions offer a strong and essential counter to the trend, according to Cornell University Professor Angela Cornell.

ILAW Global Conference 2022, worker rights, Solidarity Center, Cambridge Handbook of Labor and Democracy, worker rights, Solidarity Center“Many studies show that organized labor has played critical role in developing and defending democracy. The organized working class was the primary carrier of democracy,” Cornell said today at the International Lawyers Assisting Workers Network (ILAW) Conference opening plenary.

Cornell, co-editor of The Cambridge Handbook of Labor and Democracy, along with several book contributors, opened the Conference’s third and final day with a discussion of the handbook, an interdisciplinary and cross-regional anthology. (Hear Cornell and ILAW Board member Mery Laura Perdomo discuss unions and democracy on a recent Solidarity Center Podcast.)

More than 130 labor lawyers from 42 countries meeting October 7–9 also focused their final day on developing plans for Network’s coming years.

The Solidarity Center launched the ILAW Network in December 2018 as a global hub for worker rights lawyers to facilitate innovative litigation, help spread the adoption of pro-worker legislation and defeat anti-worker laws.

Unions Fuel Democracy

More than one quarter of the world’s population now live under democratically backsliding governments, including some of the world’s largest democracies.

Cornell listed the ways in which unions fuel democracy, including by providing a counterviling role to corporate power.

Further, said Cornell, “new research on the role of unions and in building solidarity among their members demonstrates the ways in which unions can bridge racial and national divides. Union members are less likely to support extreme views.”

Economic inequality is a destabiizing influence in most countries, Cornell said, and unions decrease inequality.

“Unions have been instrumental in the passsage of labor protections and the social safety net, including social security, minimum wage and overtime, workplace heath and safety and medical leave, among others.”

Unions Build Democracy in Latin America, Africa

Ken Roberts, a professor at Cornell University and book contributor, overviewed how unions have been bulwarks of democracy throughout Latin America.

“Labor has played a central role in trying to restore citizenship rights,” said Roberts. Since the 1960s–1980s, when unions suffered setbacks during military dictatorships and neoliberal reforms that prioritized the interests of the wealthy over working people, the key challenge has been to build broad coalitions, he said.

ILAW Global Conference 2022, worker rights, Solidarity Center, Sharan Burrow, ITUC, worker rights, Solidarity Center

ITUC General Secretary Sharan Burrow

By joining with feminist movements, indigineous communities and territorially-based urban community networks, unions have created strong and successful coaltions. Since late 1990s as part of social pushback against neoliberal model, 14 countries have elected progressive governments and labor has been an important part of moving this unprecedented number of elections, he said.

Most recently, unions were part of successful coalitions that elected progressive governments in Honduras and Colombia and are constructing broad democratic fronts against new challenges from ethnonationalist and extreme conservative groups.

In Africa, “more often than not, unions were the only force fighting decolonization,” said Evance Kalula, chair of International Labor Organization (ILO) Committee on Freedom of Association and emeritus prof of law at the University of Capetown. “Formal and informal collaboration between unions as agents of change and nationalist movements.”

Kalula and co-author Chanda Chungu, contributed the chapter on “African Perspectives on Labor Rights as Enhancers of Democratic Governance.”

Julia Lopez Lopez, a professor at the University of Barcelona, described how unions are standing up to corporations that are using the new model of app-based work to exploit transportaton workers.

“The case of transport sector is one of the cases that show unions are trying to create new strategies against market intervention against multinational efforts to liberalize labor rights,” she said.

Lopez recently participated in research projects on precarious work and social rights led by the Working Lives Research Institute.

Closing the Conference, Sharan Burrow, general secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), overviewed the challenges facing workers and their advocates and pointed to recent legal successes as well, including an agreement that the ITUC and ILO achieved with the Qatar government that ensures more rights for migrant workers, including the freedom to leave their jobs and seek alternative employment.

Making Trade Work for Workers

Making Trade Work for Workers

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Making Trade Work for Workers
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Participants in the afternoon plenary at the International Lawyers Assisting Workers Network (ILAW) Global Conference heard updates on how trade agreements are advancing worker rights and learned strategies for incorporating forced labor bans and protecting workers’ freedom to form unions.

ILAW Network Conference 2022, Eric Gottwald

Eric Gottwald, AFL-CIO

With a focus on the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), Eric Gottwald and Pablo Franco opened the panel on Trade and Labor Law Developments by describing how the 2020 agreement benefits workers.

The USMCA’s Rapid Response Mechanism was a game-changer, said Gottwald, an attorney at the AFL-CIO. The mechanism addresses freedom of association and collective bargaining violations down to the company level.

“Anyone can file a claim against a specific facility and there is an investigation and remedy that reach down to company level in way trade agreements never had before,” he said.

USMCA, which replaces the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), is especially helpful in furthering new Mexican labor law reform that seeks to dismantle the endemic union protection contract system that does not benefit workers, Gottwald and Franco said.

Pablo Franco, ILAW Global Conference 2022, worker rights, Solidarity Center

Pablo Franco. Credit: Solidarity Center

More than 130 labor lawyers from 42 countries are meeting in Brussels October 7–9 for the second global conference of the International Lawyers Assisting Workers (ILAW) Network, where members set an ambitious agenda for advocacy, litigation and education.

The Solidarity Center launched the ILAW Network in December 2018 as a global hub for worker rights lawyers to facilitate innovative litigation, help spread the adoption of pro-worker legislation and defeat anti-worker laws.

Strategies for Addressing Forced Labor Through Trade

Franz Ebert, ILAW Network Global Conference, Solidarity Center

Franz Ebert, ILO. Credit: Solidarity Center

Since 2016, forced labor has increased globally from 25 million to 27 million people, with the majority in the private sector as state-imposed forced labor has decreased, said Franz Ebert, from the International Labor Organization (ILO).

“Forced labor is a structural phenomenon to exploit workers,” he said. Concentrated corporate power and ownership, outsourcing, governance gaps and irresponsible sourcing practices combine with poverty, discrimination and limited worker rights protections so that it is clear forced labor does not occur randomly but can be traced to root causes.

Ebert reviewed western countrie’s efforts to include forced labor bans in treaties, including the European Union which is proposing a Forced Labor Trade Ban that would prohibit sale of all goods made with forced labor: imported goods, goods for export and EU goods for domestic consumption Implementation would be entrusted with member states authorities.

In the United States, Ebert noted that application of the U.S. Forced Labor Clause is increasting traction, with 43 forced labor enforcement actions between 1991 and 2018 and 32 between 2019 and 2021.

ILAW Network Conference 2022, Tibisay Morgandi

Tibisay Morgandi, WTO. Credit: Solidarity Center

While the World Trade Organization (WTO) may not appear as a likely avenue to support labor rights, said Jeffrey Vogt, panel moderator, panelists Lorand Bartels and Tibisay Morgandi offered strategies for moving forced labor bans through the WTO.

Bartels, a professor of international law at Cambridge University, compared the U.S. and EU approaches to blocking goods made by forced labor through trade, with an eye to WTO approval of such bans.

After outlining a series of options for worker rights advocates seeking to pursue trade bans on goods made with forced labor through the WTO, Morgandi concluded that citing a authoritative outside source is likely the most effective option.

“ILO body determines goods are made with forced labor, you show the measure, and your measure is ipso facto justified,” she said.

Closing out the panel, Isaac Okello Mbingi from the Central Organization of Trade Unions–Kenya, described how the new continent-wide African free trade agreement (African Continental Free Trade Area) covers a market of 1.2 million people in countries with a combined GDP of $3 trillion—yet does not include labor protocols to protect worker rights. The agreement will be difficult to modify, he said, but the process must start with educating unions and their members on how trade agreements impact worker rights.

Workers, Unions Must Be Part of Sustainable Transitions

Workers, Unions Must Be Part of Sustainable Transitions

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Workers, Unions Must Be Part of Sustainable Transitions
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As governments and employers move to address the effects of the climate crisis and toward a sustainable future, workers and their unions must be part of the discussions to ensure the creation of decent jobs and respect for workers’ fundamental rights, panelists said today in the opening plenary of the International Lawyers Assisting Workers Network (ILAW).

Bert De Wel, ITUC, ILAW Network Global Conference 2022, worker rights, Solidarity Center

Bert De Wel, ITUC. Credit: Solidarity Center

Panelists in the Right to a Just Transition plenary sought to explore how workers can bargain with employers and governments over adaptation mitigation measures to transform economies in a way that “does not undermine worker rights but that does the opposite—builds a new economy that’s better than one we have today, one that incorporates all the social protections we have been fighting for,” said Jeffrey Vogt, Solidarity Center Rule of Law director and ILAW chair.

The term “just transition” signifies a process based on fairness, rights for workers and their communities, said Bert De Wel, an economist at the International Trade Union Confederation, which included it as part of global trade union demands in the ITUC New Social Contract.

More than 130 labor lawyers from 42 countries are meeting in Brussels October 7–9 for the second global conference of the International Lawyers Assisting Workers (ILAW) Network, where members set an ambitious agenda for advocacy, litigation and education.

The Solidarity Center launched the ILAW Network in December 2018 as a global hub for worker rights lawyers to facilitate innovative litigation, help spread the adoption of pro-worker legislation and defeat anti-worker laws.

The Climate Crisis: A Worker Rights Issue

“Trade unions have played a special role in adapting and transforming to a greener and more sustainable future,” said Clément Voule, special rapporteur on the Rights to Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and of Association for the United Nations. Voule cited the example of unions in the Philippines taking a key role in the transition to clean energy within a just transition framework.

“A sustainable future will only come true if states harness the power of civil society, including unions, to ensure those fighting for climate justice receive the respect they deserve, including peaceful freedom of assembly and association,” Voule said.

Claire LaHovary, ILO, ILAW Network Global Conference 2022, worker rights, Solidarity Center

Claire LaHovary, ILO Actrav. Credit: Solidarity Center

The ITUC has incorporated the notion of just transition as part of its New Social Contract, said De Wel, while standards set by the International Labor Organization (ILO) offer worker rights lawyers a framework for moving to a just transition, said Claire LaHovary with ILO Bureau for Workers’ Activities (ACTRAV).

LaHovary outlined applicable ILO standards and resolutions, including Resolution 205 on Employment and Decent Work for Peace and Resilience Recommendation (2017) that, in part, addresses the need to consider “the impact and consequences of conflicts and disasters for poverty and development, human rights and dignity, decent work and sustainable enterprises. The ILO also created a user’s manual to the ILO’s Guidelines for a just transition towards environmentally sustainable economies and societies for all, a key tool for worker rights advocates.

Two Solidarity Center staff offered grassroots view of the challenges ensuring worker voices are heard in sustainable transition discussions, including the need to educate workers about how the effects of the climate crisis on their livelihoods and health.

In Bangladesh, which has been identified as the seventh most vulnerable country to climate change, worker awareness of the issue is minimal, said AKM Nasim, Solidrity Center Bangledesh director.

“The Solidarity Center is trying to raise capacity of unions to negotiate agreements addressing climate change,” he said, but worker face strong resistance from employers on so many other workplaces issues their unions often are struggling to survive.

Carlos Gaurnizo at the Solidarity Center in Colombia, described the difficulties of shifting to a sustainable model from an extractive economy while ensuring worker rights. One key is to connect unions with the diverse groups affected by the climate crisis, he said.

“We have been working with communities and trade unions and work with all the international movements,” he said. It is also essential to consider cultural differences, including those of Indigenous communities that have a closer relationship with nature, he said. The recent election of a government that supports sustainable policies has opened new avenues for progress, he said.

“We need an ecological vision so we can understand we are only one small part of nature. We need to live together and co-exist harmoniously.”

Innovations in Arbitration

Christy Hoffman, UNI Global Union, Clement Voule, UN,ILAW Global Conference 2022, worker rights, Solidarity Center

UNI Global Union General Secretary Christy Hoffman. Credit: Solidarity Center

At the second plenary panel, International Arbitration for Labor Rights, UNI Global Union General Secretary Christy Hoffman, Katerina Yiannibas at the Columbia University School of Law, discussed unique innovations in the arbitration process that better address the needs of workers and others seeking remedy.

Following the negotiation of the legally-binding Bangladesh Accord on Fire and Buiding Safety with fashion brand corporations to protect garment worker rights, UNI and IndustriALL moved to streamline the arbitration process to better serve workers, said Hoffman. The new framework reduces time to 180 days in part by combining arbitration and concilliation.

Yiannibas described the Model Arbtration Clauses for the Resolution of Disputes under Enforceable Brand Agreements 2020 that advances a streamlined arbitration system with a rapid timeline that protects impartiality and due process while avoiding excessive litigiousness, promoting transparency, alleviating burdensome costs, and providing final and binding enforcement.

Yiannibas and worker rights attorney Lance Compa led the team of lawyers who created the model dispute resolution system, which was narrowed down from the Hague Rules on Business and Human Rights Arbitration that Yianniba spearheaded in 2019.

ILAW Network Members Suggest Areas for Resources, Support

ILAW Network Members Suggest Areas for Resources, Support

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ILAW Network Members Suggest Areas for Resources, Support
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Databases of legislation, compilations of laws and successful practices that advance worker rights, trainings, and coordination with allied organizations are some of the suggestions members of the International Lawyers Assisting Workers Network (ILAW) recommended the organization pursue.

ILAW Global Conference, Madhulika Tatigotia 2022, worker rights, Solidarity Center

Madhulika Tatigotia. Credit: Solidarity Center

Meeting in breakout groups on the first day of the ILAW Network Global Conference, worker rights lawyers shared their work on, and requested support in, areas involving the global supply chain, informal economy work, employment discrimination, migrant worker rights, workplace safety and health and gender-based violence and harassment in the world of work.

“There is a need for more cooperation and sharing of litigation strategies and legal expert opinions across countries,” said Madhulika Tatigotla, a worker rights lawyer from India, who reported back to the afternoon plenary session on recommendations for improving worker rights in global supply chains.

She said ILAW members noted the need for a database of supply chain cases and a map of supply chains to better understand the networks. The group also proposed ILAW Network hold webinars on European Union due diligence laws and create a report on business and human rights litigation around supply chains modeled after ILAW’s 2021 report, “Taken for a Ride: Litigating the Digital Platform Model.”

More than 130 labor lawyers from 42 countries are meeting in Brussels October 7–9 for the second global conference of the International Lawyers Assisting Workers (ILAW) Network, where members set an ambitious agenda for advocacy, litigation and education.

The Solidarity Center launched the ILAW Network in December 2018 as a global hub for worker rights lawyers to facilitate innovative litigation, help spread the adoption of pro-worker legislation and defeat anti-worker laws.

Addressing Gender-Based Violence at Work

ILAW Global Conference 2022, worker rights, Solidarity Center, Furaha Joy Sekai Saungweme

Furaha Joy Sekai Saungweme. Credit: Solidarity Center

“There are many grounds for discrimination and this provoked a very rich debate,” said Viviana Osoro Prez, Solidarity Center Equality and Inclusion Department director, who shared participants’ input from the employment discrimination breakout. “We looked into how important it is to create wider alliances between different movements, and for all legal assistance to be more connected with unions and society.” The group suggested ILAW Network create a repository of clauses from collective bargaining agreements on violence and harassment at work and trainings on discrimination in the workplace.

Gender-based violence and harassment (GBVH) in the world of work also is being addressed through the International Labor Organization Convention 190, and ILAW members in the GBVH breakout discussed how they are working to incorporate its provisions in collective bargaining agreements and pushing for leave from work for those who have experienced domestic violence. Reporting back from the GBVH group, Furaha Joy Sekai Saungweme, a worker rights lawyer in Tanzania, noted a need for information sharing by countries that have ratified C190 and also on collective bargaining clauses and legal reform efforts addressing GBVH.

Coordination of Best Practices

Teresa Marchiori who, with J.J. Rosenbaum at GLJ-ILRF, led the breakout on the informal economy, reported the need for coordination of best practices in winning rights for informal economy workers, nearly none of whom are covered by labor laws in most countries. She noted an invitation from StreetNet International, a global network of workers in the informal economy, to join them in sharing legislative initiatives.

ILAW Global Conference 2022, Michael Felsen

Michael Felsen. Credit: Solidarity Center

Migrant workers are 5 percent of the w­­orkforce but comprise 15 percent of workers in forced labor,” said Neha Misra, Solidarity Center Global Lead for Migration and Human Trafficking. Misra and Sarah Mehta from the Migrant Justice Institute reported back from the migrant worker breakout meeting where members suggested ILAW spearhead draft laws on labor migration and look at issues such as how best to ensure migrant workers have the same legal rights as all workers. Fundamentally, “they must have legal rights to form unions and collectively bargain to improve their working conditions,” Misra said.

Worker rights lawyers reported a wide range of health and safety issues, many occurring in new forms of work such as digital employment and telework, said worker rights attorney Michael Felsen. “One of the key takeaways is that we all want ILAW to assist in getting governments to do better law enforcement around safety and health, push goverments to protect workers through new and current legislation, research successful clauses in collective bargaining agreements on safety and health and push governments to enact and enforce safety and health legislation.

Worker Rights Lawyers from Across the Globe Set to Meet

Worker Rights Lawyers from Across the Globe Set to Meet

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Worker Rights Lawyers from Across the Globe Set to Meet
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More than 140 labor lawyers from 42 countries are gathering in Brussels October 6–9 for the second global conference of the International Lawyers Assisting Workers (ILAW) Network, where they will exchange legal strategies for the promotion and defense of the rights and interests of workers and trade unions, explore coalitions with allies in the feminist, environmental and human rights movements and plan the network’s strategic goals for the next two years.

Participants at the ILAW Network Global Conference also will evaluate progress since the first ILAW Conference in 2019, where members set an ambitious agenda for advocacy, litigation and education. Speakers include Clément Voule, Special Rapporteur on the Rights to Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and of Association for the United Nations and UNI Global Union General Secretary Christy Hoffman.

Benson Upah, an ILAW Advisory Board member and coordinator in Nigeria, says one of the network’s accomplishments since the last conference is building membership—from some 350 members to more than 800 members in dozens of countries. The ILAW Network also has hired regional coordinators in Africa, the Americas, Asia and East Europe/Central Asia, fulfilling one of the members’ key recommendations at the first conference.

“The growth of the ILAW Network worldwide represents a significant step toward improving worker rights in areas of strategic litigation, bolstering labor legislation and holding governments accountable to their obligations under international labor standards,” says Solidarity Center Rule of Law Director and ILAW Network Chair Jeffrey Vogt. “ILAW lawyers proactively represent workers and unions and are a key part of workers’ struggles for rights, dignity and justice on the job.”

The Solidarity Center launched the ILAW Network in December 2018 as a global hub for worker rights lawyers to facilitate innovative litigation, help spread the adoption of pro-worker legislation and defeat anti-worker laws.

Far-Reaching Support for Worker Rights

ILAW litigation supporting worker rights is both broad and finely targeted. One of the network’s key recent victories, says Mónica Tepfer, an ILAW Board member, is the January 2022 decision by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights that affirmed workers’ right to strike in Guatemala. The ILAW Network filed a 40-page amicus brief successfully arguing that a series of court rulings denying workers’ right to strike if two-thirds vote to do so violated the country’s Labor Code. 

ILAW assisted the Georgian Trade Union Confederation in developing a report, “The Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Women’s Labor Rights,” which included recommendations that ILAW and Georgian trade unions are now advocating for at the national level to improve worker rights protections for women.

In Uganda, ILAW provided legal support for more than 170 street vendors who were arrested following eviction orders and charged with offenses such as selling goods without a license and public nuisance. ILAW worked in collaboration with unions organizing in the informal economy and with partners such as WIEGO, Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung and StreetNet International.

ILAW from the beginning has worked closely with partners globally. “The collaboration between the ILAW Network and the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC)—a founding member and board member of ILAW—provides ITUC affiliates the best legal advice and assistance to advance labor right and I expect that that collaboration to continue and to deepen,” says Paapa Danquah, ILAW Board member and ITUC Legal Director.

A Push for Platform Worker Rights

Along with a focus on workers in the informal economy such as street vendors, ILAW has engaged in extensive research and legal support on behalf of app-based workers. For instance in Nigeria, ILAW backed litigation advancing the rights of drivers hired through digital platforms such as Uber and Bolt. The drivers are misclassified as independent contractors rather than as employees and so do not receive paid sick leave, compensation for workplace injuries or other basic protections provided by the country’s labor laws.

ILAW also researched gig workers’ labor rights protection in Central Asia, looking into the digital platform markets and identifying drivers’ working conditions. In addition, ILAW produced to the report, “Taken for a Ride: Litigating the Digital Platform Model,” in response to requests from ILAW Network members for comparative analysis on litigation against digital platform companies around the world. The network also compiled the Database on Standards and Decisions on Digital Platform Work in Latin America that includes draft laws, legislation and decisions regarding digital platform work.

In July, the ILAW Network launched the Litigation Fund to provide modest financial assistance to promote or defend the rights and interests of workers and unions. Supported by the Open Society Foundations, the fund currently is supporting litigation in Nepal, Uganda and Zimbabwe.

Additional ILAW network accomplishments since the 2019 conference include:

  • Setting up an online member-accessible database with expert and member-sourced recommended legislative or union contract provisions addressing workers’ key issues.
  • Publishing the Global Labour Rights Reporter, a law journal offering a forum for labor and employment law practitioners globally, including ILAW Network members, to grapple with the legal and practical issues that directly affect workers and their organizations.
  • Launching a webinar series to provide members learning opportunities on topics such as workers’ rights on digital platforms, promotion of International Labor Organization Convention 190 to end gender-based violence at work, and migrant workers’ rights.

Since the last ILAW conference, “the visibility of the Network has been significantly raised among the labor rights lawyers, scholars and others interested in the labor rights related issues,” says Raisa Liparteliani, ILAW Network board member. “In my opinion the periodic review, the Global Labour Rights Reporter (GLRR) positively affected to this process.”

The 2022 conference offers members a renewed opportunity to shape the coming years of the network and strategize on addressing emerging issues such as impacts of climate change on labor, the future of work, the emergence of artificial intelligence in managing workers and the new challenges in the changing workplace.

Stop back here for regular coverage of ILAW Network Global Conference and follow live updates on Twitter @ILAW_Network.

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