Note: Euan Gibb is an active member of Local 707 of the Canadian Auto Workers Union and works on an assembly line in an automotive plant owned by one of the Big 3 North American companies operating in Southern Ontario. He has been active in the global social justice movement (misnamed anti-globalization movement) since the mid 90s. He has completed a degree in the Labour Studies department of McMaster University in Canada and most recently participated in the pilot year of the Global Labour University.
Since this paper was written (September 2005) three more International Framework Agreements were signed (Arcelor by IMF, Schwan-Stabilo by IMF and Lafarge by IFBWW) bringing the total from 39 to 42).
Introduction
Debates related to the extent and characteristics of corporate power during the present phase of capitalism are raging. Within these debates, it is commonly asserted that we have entered an era characterized by a private corporate power that knows few bounds or limits. Consequently, capital is empowered to such an extent that it is globally mobile, scouring the globe in search of its next addiction-driven profit fix. Similarly, many argue that governments are powerless to prevent the worst abuses and exploitative relationships that result directly from this ascending corporate power.
The processes that are at the centre of these debates are commonly referred to as ‘globalization’. Globalization is a political project and process (Moody 1997) that has been facilitated by developments in communication technologies and reductions in the costs of transportation. Globalization promises prosperity and development if the rules of capitalist markets are accepted and allowed to function unimpeded. Specifically, this means strong protection of private property rights, liberalized financial markets and weakened protection for workers.
The importance of developing countries in the Global South for this project of globalization has increased over the last thirty years. Foreign direct investment (FDI) flows into the Global South have grown substantially throughout this period. Recently, increased flows of FDI have been occurring at the same time as the movement of FDI into developed countries have marginally declined. The increasing importance of the Global South is also reflected in trade figures. The ‘degree of transnationalization’ of the top 100 non-financial transnational corporations (TNCs) has been steadily intensifying. The numbers of foreign assets, sales and employment of these companies have all grown over the last few years. (UNCTAD 2004) Approximately 1/3 of world trade is intra-company and another third involves at least one TNC. (Scherrer & Greven 2001: 76) All of these indicators describe that an increasing number of workers are being ‘integrated’ into the global economy.
The integration is deeper and more extensive than the ‘global’ world of a hundred years ago. (Bordo et. al. 1999) These indicators also depict a globalization that offers an increased capability of TNCs to pit workers in one region of the world against workers in another region. Increased competition between workers fuels a downward pressure on labour standards. Additionally, TNCs have achieved an increased power to put suppliers into direct competition. This means that competition between workers in the South has also been intensified, applying even more downward pressure. However, the promise of globalization is that as these workers increasingly participate in the global economy, their situation will inevitably improve.
The world economy is not as ‘global’ as FDI and trade intensity numbers indicate. Rather, globalization is often fragmented, incomplete and extremely uneven. Most production and consumption remains anchored at the local level. (Moody 1997: 6) 90% of the top 100 TNCs have their headquarters in the triad of the United States, Europe and Japan. 68% of FDI flows are directed between the countries of the Global North. (UNCTAD 2004) Martin Khor, Director of the Third World Institute claims that “there are only eleven developing countries which are an integral part of globalization in the late twentieth century.” (Khor 2000: 8) All of these numbers describe a ‘globalization’ where power remains largely centralized in the Global North.
The promised benefits of globalization have failed to appear. Where positive benefits can be linked to globalization, they have not been widely shared (Moody 1997: 41) Many countries and people have been unable to escape acute problems caused by paralyzing levels of debt and chronically low and unstable export prices. (Khor 2000: 7) Workers have not fared well in these circumstances. Increasing competition between workers and rising inequality are the products of the alignment of public policy with corporate planning. (Babson 2000:15, Hanagan 2003:486) State policies have increasingly converged with private, corporate goals during this period of capitalism. The relative power of TNCs operating under these circumstances has increased.
Deepening capitalist globalization and the reduced regulatory role of nation states enhances the downward pressure on workers’ basic rights. The clearest and most generally respected reference point that we have for identifying and evaluating abuse of workers and their rights is the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) core labour standards. This notion of standards is normative rather than descriptive. The ILO has identified eight ‘Fundamental Rights at Work.’ These rights are articulated as ILO Conventions in the areas of freedom of association, forced labour, equality and child labour.
These conventions have received widespread ratification by member countries by their being passed through their national parliaments. Variations of the principles that underlie these conventions are widely protected in national law throughout the world.[1] Clearly, there is widespread support for both the spirit and the substance of these conventions.
The clear support for these core labour standards (CLS) does not translate into their substantive protection. A superficial survey of the ILO or International Confederations of Free Trade Union (ICFTU) web sites is sufficient to educe the impression that violations of this basic set of workers’ rights are both publicly known about and pervasive throughout the global economy. Violations are occurring in a systematic way in both the global North and South. (ICFTU 2004a) There is no clear answer to the question of whether workers’ rights are compatible with the present phase of capitalism. This opens the question of where responsibility should lie in protection of these rights.
Historically, organized workers have been able to gain concessions from nation states in the form of legal protection of these basic rights. While states have retreated from various forms of regulation, they are not powerless and passive actors in the global economy. (Yeates 2002) Rather, nations with strong domestic institutions that are adaptable in a changing environment has a large impact on whether they are able to exercise regulatory and other powers. (Weiss 1998, 1999) Whether states have actively chosen to cede their regulatory power over private capital or alternatively, have seen power appropriated by an increasingly global capital is not the most important point. In either instance, the growing number of violations reported by the ICFTU’s Annual Survey provides evidence that a strategy of protecting CLS through exclusive reliance on states and their regulatory capacities will fail.
This does not mean that states do not have a role, or that national governments are hereby absolved of all responsibility to protect CLS. Responsibility for the promotion and protection of workers’ rights remains firmly in the jurisdiction of the state. Domestic efforts such as national labour laws and regular inspections to enforce these laws are absolutely necessary. In a complementary way, international efforts to protect workers’ rights at the ILO and through other instruments such as strengthened workers’ rights clauses in bilateral or regional trade agreements, where these are appropriate (Scherrer & Greven 2001:75) should continue. However, states have proven that they cannot be relied upon to protect CLS in a thorough and comprehensive manner and so a strategy that over-emphasizes state capacity and willingness to do so is inadequate.
Similarly, the potential role of the ILO should not be a central focus of near-term strategies to protect CLS. The activities of the ILO are based on consensus and the voluntary actions of member states. The most important tools used by the ILO are moral suasion and technical assistance. An important debate about raising the profile of labour standards occurred at the ILO in 1998. The outcome defined the eight ‘Fundamental Rights at Work’ that are referred to as the core labour standards, or core conventions. This resolution to the labour standards debate was accepted despite the risk that the ILO’s almost 200 conventions would be understood by the public as only these eight.
Unfortunately, a mechanism to enforce these eight fundamental rights did not emerge from the debate and 1998 Declaration. Moral suasion and technical assistance remain the most important tools of the organization. Persistent and widespread violations of CLS has led some commentators to claim that an ‘effectiveness crisis’ has evolved at the ILO. (Hagen 2003) The 1998 Declaration clearly stated that member states are obligated to respect core labour standards (Sengenberger 2002: 31) but evidence of violations remains abundant. Thus, a strategy aimed at improving the efficacy of CLS cannot rely heavily on the ILO at this time. While longer-term strategies must include state regulation and support from the ILO, exclusive reliance or deferment of CLS enforcement to these bodies is plainly insufficient.
The most important actors involved in ongoing efforts to improve the effectiveness of CLS are those that are most impacted by the violation of these rights – workers themselves. Workers and their unions are obviously at the centre of the struggle to have these rights respected. This struggle is fundamental to the trade union movement and its revitalization during the present phase of capitalism. (Ng 2001) Trade union strategies aimed at protection of CLS may be broadly split into two areas. First, trade unions focus externally on lobbying national governments and international organizations in order to build support for stronger protection of CLS. Second, trade unions focus internally on building their own strength and capacities for independent action. Workers, their unions and the Global Union Federations (GUFs) have been developing a new tool aimed at improving compliance with CLS in this context of the project of globalization, retreating states and an ILO that is prevented from enforcing its core conventions. These are known as International Framework Agreements (IFAs). The IFAs provide an example of trade unions and their GUFs increasing their own strength and capacity to act in the global economy.
IFAs are an increasingly important instrument that can be used by workers and their unions that are organizing to elevate the effectiveness of the core conventions. A basic introduction of IFAs will be presented in the first section of this paper. The history and context of IFAs is included in this section. This leads into a detailed analysis of the content of all of the IFAs that have been negotiated to date. The third section will make it clear that IFAs do not provide evidence that collective bargaining between unions and multinational corporations is being ‘scaled up’ to the international level and that IFAs do not provide a substitute for local or national level bargaining. In order to deal with the argument that IFAs are no different than the multitude of ‘corporate social responsibility’ (CSR) initiatives that are presently proliferating the fourth sectionwill show that such agreements are fundamentally different than CSR. Some of the specific criticisms and possibilities that IFAs offer the project of improving CLS will be explored in the fifth and sixth sections. In the final section, these possibilities will be elaborated through the case study of a Turkish automotive parts producer that supplies parts to major TNCs.
1. History and Context of International Framework Agreements
International framework agreements are documents that are negotiated and signed by senior management of multinational corporations and the relevant Global Union Federation (GUF). Many of the IFAs have been organized and negotiated through the European Works Councils (EWCs), with multinational companies headquartered in Europe. The first IFA was signed by the International Union of Food Workers (IUF) on August 23, 1988. Thirty-nine agreements have now been signed by the various GUFs. These agreements cover close to four million workers that are directly employed by the signatory TNCs.
As the title indicates, these documents are designed to establish frameworks. There is some variance between the IFAs, but almost all of them use the ILO Core Labour Standards as a basis.
The framework agreements are a product of a particular political and historical context. First, the historic activities of the Global Union Federations make them an extremely relevant and appropriate actor in the development of such agreements. They are ideally placed to contribute to a coordinated trade union response to the increasingly intense transnationalization of capitalism. The greatest possibility of successful negotiation and implementation of IFAs comes from the GUFs. Second, the broader ‘trade and labour standards’ debate that has occurred at the international level has increased the necessity and importance of the framework agreements. Also, the framework agreements are partly a product of the ongoing efforts of TNCs to make a public case that they are good ‘corporate citizens’ and are ‘socially responsible.’ The recent and rapid expansion of corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives andthe relationship between CSR and IFAs will be explored in the fourth section.
First, IFAs are a product of the historic role and purpose of the GUFs. The GUFs are “autonomous, self-governing, and democratic organizations,” (ICFTU 2001: 24) that are made up of national member unions. Their main functions are to provide information, leadership training, support and coordination of solidarity work throughout national unions who are operating in industries that are internationalized. (Moody 1997: 234) The international trade union movement began building ‘countervailing’ labour power (Munck 2002: 145) against the TNCs from the 1960s onwards. As TNCs internationalized their production and supply-chains in this period, national unions and the GUFs internationalized their coordination efforts.
Previously known as International Trade Secretariats, the GUFs were at the centre of the efforts to build this countervailing power. One of the central goals in the development of this strategy was the expansion of transnational collective bargaining, although the ambition of harmonizing wages and working conditions using this tool was never successfully met. (Müller & Rüb 2005) A majorinherent difficulty with the project of expanding transnational collective bargaining was a reluctance to devolve authority from the national to the international level. (Munck 2002:148) Throughout the 1970s, the GUFs with member unions in the most internationalized industries were active in supporting and developing ‘World Company Councils.’ For example, the IMF, IUF and ICEM all adopted this form of coordination. These councils were made up of representatives from the various national trade unions that represented workers within a given company. It was not uncommon that the more powerful unions in the home country of the TNC would apply pressure to management in efforts to solve a dispute occurring in another country. (Moody 1997: 235) Similar to the goal of transnational collective bargaining, few of these councils survived the test of time since such meetings are extremely expensive, relying on simultaneous translation in intensely pluralistic circumstances. Perhaps the claim that trade unions “did not really need multinational collective bargaining” in the 1970s (Visser 1998:246, quoted in Munck 2002:149) holds some merit. Many of the goals of strong national trade unions, including taking wages out of competition, could be achieved most successfully at the national level rather than the international during this period.
Ultimately, the GUFs are constrained in their efforts to build international trade union structures. They are federations that must work on consensus. This means that as long as national member unions are unwilling to promote or sustain international tools like transnational collective bargaining or World Company Councils, there is little that the GUFs can do. The present situation has changed markedly since the 70s. National-level collective bargaining, the promotion of protectionist trade policies and efforts to take wages out of competition (between unionized and non-unionized workers) have lost much of their effectiveness due to trade liberalization, heightened capital mobility and declining welfare states. (Stillerman 2003:580)
The GUFs possess well-developed skills and are well placed to contribute to this goal because in order for framework agreements to become effective, they require wide distribution. Many of the agreements include a statement of responsibility for management to circulate the agreement internally. It is a good starting point that management has an obligation to circulate the IFA, but this does not guarantee that workers, particularly those who are unorganized will have any knowledge about the agreement. Many of the trade union networks that are required for distribution of this type of information have their centres in the offices of the and awareness within affiliates across national borders. (Fairbrother & Hammer 2004)
In the present context of neoliberal capitalism and intensifying pressures of global competitiveness, more and more workers in TNCs are being told that national management can’t make decisions. (Tørres & Gunnes 2003: 6) This means that there is clearly a growing need for an instrument like IFAs. Former General Secretary of the IUF, Dan Gallin has argued that “the point of international bargaining is to engage the responsibility of the company at the level where decisions are actually made (the same relationship as between local and national bargaining in a national company.)” (Gallin 2005) The GUF’s have an increasingly important role to play in this context (Wells 1998: 9) and are situated in an ideal position to facilitate the growth and implementation of IFAs.
In addition to the evolving role of the GUFs since the 60s, development of framework agreements are partly a response to outcomes of the broader trade and labour standards debate that continues to occur at the international level. A complete lack of advancement of any international agenda to protect and enforce CLS has led to the GUFs engaging with alternative strategies. This debate began in the 1970s when it was becoming increasingly popular for national governments to explicitly deny workers’ rights in Export Processing Zones (EPZs) as part of their ‘development’ strategies. (Ng 2001: 109) The ICFTU had been pushing for a link between international trade and labour standards since the 1980s. The basic argument for a link between trade and labour standards was that labour standards are undermined by trade liberalization that removes obstacles to a TNCs ability to move production to area where workers’ rights are the weakest, or least enforced. This creates an incentive for countries that generally adhere more often to core labour standards to reduce standards in order to hold on to or attract new investment. Thus, a ‘downward spiral’ is created where workers that have some rights are blackmailed against those who do not have any rights. Enforcement of core labour standards could effectively provide a ‘floor’ that no-one could go below in order to ‘compete.’
There was some debate about the link between trade and labour standards at the 1995 Uruguay round of trade negotiations that transformed the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) into the World Trade Organization, (WTO) but the discussion did not get far. Resultantly, a major push to have an organized approach to linking social standards and international trade came out of the 1996 ICFTU congress.
An intense debate both outside and within the WTO resulted from the proposal to link the WTO’s powerful disciplining potential to international labour standards. The idea was to use the power of the WTO’s ‘trade sanctions’ dispute settlement mechanisms in order to persuade demonstrable violators to uphold core labour standards. The argument maintained broad appeal for the international trade union movement in the context of an ILO that was unable to prevent widespread violations of workers’ rights.
Within the ICFTU and the GUFs, there was broad support for this so-called ‘social clause’ at the WTO. (Fairbrother & Hammer 2004) There were also many detractors. Importantly, the Central Trade Union Organizations of India expressed strong opposition, (Hensman 2001: 427) accusing supporters of the clause of protectionism. Elements of nationalism were easily detectable on all sides of the debate.
Beyond the trade union movement, many developing country governments had argued strongly against any linkages between trade and labour standards, making the case that they were protectionist. This debate reached a peak at the 1996 Singapore ministerial of the WTO, where any linkage was officially and clearly rejected. A U.S. government staff representative in the National Security and International Affairs Division claimed that “because many WTO member countries in both the developed and developing worldfeared that the creation of a work program [on core labour standards] in the WTO would lead to mandated international labor standards that could inhibit their economic development or serve as protectionist barriers, they opposed having a trade-labor standards link through the WTO.” (Hecker 1997) Malaysia’s International Trade Minister, Rafidah Aziz, was quoted at the Singapore ministerial as saying “there will be no more talk of labour standards in the WTO. No way, no discussions, no continuing work, nothing.” (Khor 1999)
Despite the strong rejection of any linkage between labour standards and trade that resulted from this meeting, the U.S. delegation to the WTO pushed the efforts ahead. In the lead up to the 1999 Seattle ministerial meetings, the U.S. delegation proposed the creation of a working group on trade and labour standards. The scope of the proposed group was in fact much wider than only trade and labour standards. It would have also been charged with responsibility to explore:
* Trade and employment – examination of the effects of increased international trade and investment on levels and composition of countries’ employment;
* Trade and social protections – relationship between increased openness in trade and investment and basic social protections and safety nets;
* Trade and core labour standards – relationship between economic development, international trade and investment, and the implementation of core labour standards;
* Positive trade policy incentives and core labour standards – the scope for positive trade policy incentives to promote implementation of core labour standards;
* Trade and forced or exploitive child labour – the extent of forced or exploitive child labour in industries engaged in international trade; and
* Trade and derogation from national labour standards – examination of the effects of derogation from national labour standards (including in export-processing zones) on international trade, investment and economic development. (quoted in Khor 1999)
The establishment of this working group or any other that was related to labour standards was completely rejected by delegates from the South. This proposal was much wider than the original from the 1996 Singapore ministerial. The debate over trade and labour standards at the WTO was one of the many related reasons that negotiations fell apart at that 1999 meeting in Seattle. The debates within the WTO and also within the international trade union movement have been extremely divisive. This has contributed to an international paralysis regarding the agenda of protecting core labour standards.
The IFAs have been advanced and gained momentum in the GUFs partly as a response to the lack of progress for the agenda of increasing the efficacy of the core labour standards. Once the contentious ‘trade and labour standards’ linkage at the WTO resulted in the ambiguous rejection of the connection, another route to protection of CLS was closed. International trade union organizations’ efforts to lobby for stronger protection of CLS has so far received a negative response. As a result, the GUFs’ engagement with alternative strategies, including the effort to build the independent strength and capacity of trade unions to act was given momentum. One expression of this contribution to the building of independent power is the recent expansion of international framework agreements.
2. Analysis of International Framework Agreements
The following analysis of the language included in the IFAs is based on the data compiled in Appendix 2. This is an evaluation of the content of the thirty-nine agreements. It clearly shows continuity between the agreements across the IFAs of the various GUFs that have negotiated. Some of the areas of divergence in the language of the IFAs are clearly articulated. This analysis offers a clear picture of what clauses are included in the IFAs as well as explicit statements about their frequency.
Inclusion of ILO Conventions in IFAs
Roughly three quarters of the IFAs that have been signed contain explicit reference to all of the core labour standards (29/39). Five of the remaining agreements do not include all of the CLS, because they contain a reference to only one of the two conventions aimed at eliminating child labour. If these agreements are included in the number that list the core standards, over eighty percent (34/39) contain unambiguous reference to the CLS at their core.
The CLS are typically identified in the agreement by their number ascribed by the ILO. Three quarters of the IFAs that have clearly articulated all of the core labour standards mention them by their convention numbers (27/39). Ideally, IFAs provide an overarching framework of these clearly defined workers’ rights within which the signatory company agrees to respect and operate. Only two of the IFAs do not mention Convention 98 on the right to bargain collectively. A few of the agreements refer to labour rights, such as the right to organize and bargain collectively, but these are not referred to in the agreement as the specific ‘core labour standards’ of the ILO.
Most of the IFAs also contain references to ILO Conventions that are not part of the eight fundamental rights. This is the case in twenty-seven of the thirty-nine agreements. ILO Convention Number 135[2] is referred to most commonly. It is included in nineteen IFAs. Significantly, all of the GUFs have signed at least three IFAs that include Convention 135. This indicates a priority being placed on this Convention despite its exclusion from the group of eight core labour standards.
Suppliers and Sub-Contractors
Many of the IFAs include language related to suppliers and sub-contractors. This is the case for thirty of the IFAs. Strong versions of supplier related language articulate a clear commitment on the part of signatories to assist suppliers’ efforts to guarantee that CLS are respected. This may include the ultimate consequence of termination of commercial relationships for repeated and proven violations of CLS. Many of the IFAs state that they expect suppliers to respect the core labour standards and to introduce an official policy to that effect. The potential number of workers who the framework agreement applies to grows rapidly beyond four million when suppliers are covered by the IFA.
National Legislation and Additional ILO Conventions
All of the IFAs include language that goes beyond the core labour standards. Specifically, thirty-two of the IFAs make explicit reference to occupational health and safety issues. Eleven of the IMF agreements, three of the five UNI agreements and all seven of the IFBWW agreements contain clauses related to working time and hours of work (21/39). Most of the IFAs also refer to ‘fair’ wages, education and training, the environment and workplace restructuring. Commonly, language in these areas is composed of statements that oblige management to respect and adhere to applicable national laws. All of the IMF agreements include clauses that require the signatory TNC to adhere to national legislation. Twenty-seven of the thirty-nine IFAs oblige management to adhere to national laws in at least one of the areas of health and safety, working time, wages, education and the environment. Some of the clauses also make explicit reference to relevant ILO Conventions beyond the CLS. This is the case for clauses on health and safety, working time and remuneration.[3]
Communication, Regular Meetings and Expiry
Almost all of the IFAs make clear statements about the communication of the agreement to workers and suppliers, only five of the IFAs do not have such language. Four of these instances are the agreements signed by UNI. Some of the examples of the communication language plainly oblige management to inform all workers and suppliers of the existence of the IFA. Other occurrences state that management is responsible to inform management in all of its locations, whereas the signatory GUF is responsible to inform trade union affiliates and workers about the agreement. There are several permutations of language that posits a non-specific ‘joint responsibility’ for distribution of the IFA.
Almost eighty percent of the IFAs include statements that commit the signatories to meet regularly to discuss the agreement and the progress of its implementation (31/39). Most commonly, these meetings are required at least annually. They are often linked to the EWC meetings where this is a relevant institution. While some of the IFAs have expiry dates (13/39), the majority do not (26/39). This could mean that the IFAs are understood as a one-time statement of a principled agreement to respect core labour standards. The ICFTU claims that “it is understood that they can be modified or re-negotiated at any time.” (ICFTU 2001:98) It is not clear if it is widely understood by the signatories that the IFA may be re-negotiated at any time. None of the IMF agreements include an expiry date. The ICEM agreements are the most likely to include expiry dates. These ICEM IFAs are usually valid for a period of two years (8/10). For all GUFs that have signed IFAs that expire, one is valid for only one year, while four others are valid for three or five years.
Dispute Resolution
Thirty-three of the thirty-nine IFAs include some language on dispute resolution. Most of these references mention the signatories (which is almost always the GUFs) or they mention the GUFs specifically as a party that maintains a role in the event of disputes. The IFBWW, IUF and ICEM have been particularly successful at being named specifically in the IFAs, thus guaranteeing that they have a secured role for the future administration and dispute settlement related to the IFA. Only nine of the agreements contain clauses that commit management to neutrality in organizing campaigns (other than stated commitments to respect Convention Number 87 on the right to organize) or that they will not hire scabs (replacement workers) during disputes.
Other Documents Referenced
Slightly less than half of the IFAs include some reference to other documents (17/39). Most commonly, references are made to the UN Global Compact, (8/17) the ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work (6/17) the UN Declaration of Human Rights, (5/17) the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, (4/17) and various, company specific, usually unilateral corporate social responsibility documents (9/17). The references to such documents typically state that management respects these other standards in addition to the IFA that has been signed.
There is a high degree of similarity between the IFAs despite the diversity of TNCs that have signed. Some of the sectors in which TNCs that have signed IFAS are active include telecommunications, food services, automotive assembly, construction and energy. Where divergences between the agreements are observable, these are typically examples of differential emphasis rather than differences in the underlying premise or purpose of the documents. For example, thirty of the IFAs include language that provides an entry point into the supply networks of signatory TNCs, but the content of this language varies. Such differences do not offer evidence that the GUFs are employing differing strategies with the IFAs. These small differences of emphasis are a product of and reflect the particular political and power relationships that exist between national trade unions, the GUFs and the signatory TNCs.
3. Some of the Differences between International Framework Agreements and International Collective Bargaining
The development of IFAs needs to be separated from the argument that collective bargaining between unions and multinational corporations is being ‘scaled up’ to the international level. The ICFTU has claimed that the framework agreements “can be seen as the start of international collective bargaining.” (ICFTU 2001) A typical optimistic argument claims that “when companies were local, unions had local agreements; when companies were national, unions had national agreements. Now in the global economy we need global agreements.” (UNI 2005) Such an argument gains the merit of some intuitive appeal. However, there is very little evidence to support the inference that the present global agreements are equivalent to local or national agreements. IFAs are not designed to substitute for local or national agreements in any way.
Of primary importance is the wholesale absence of a regulatory framework for any form of industrial relations at the international level. (ICFTU 2001: 91) The absence of this framework is significant because it means that there is not a ‘system’ of international industrial relations within which IFAs would theoretically hold a legitimated place. There is some evidence that an international, or more specifically, a regional framework for industrial relations is evolving in Europe. The regional growth of this framework and the European Works Councils (EWCs) that are involved in the process will be explored in the next section. For the purposes of making the IFAs distinct from national and sub-national collective bargaining, the legal differences between the documents are important.
Nationally negotiated collective agreements between trade unions and employers are legally binding documents. They contain clear expiry dates and consequences of not reaching an agreement before this date. Workers and trade unions are able to enforce collective agreements through legal channels. Final resolutions of disputes concerning such agreements eventually find their way into national or sub-national labour tribunals and courts. These legal institutions are charged with interpreting contract language and related evidence.
Conversely, disputes over violations of core labour standards articulated in an IFA do not have their final resolution in any court or labour tribunal. Rather, the power of enforcement of an IFA lies in the ability of unions and GUFs to assemble enough political and moral pressure on a multinational to induce the desired response. This is similar to the power of the World Company Councils that were active in the 70s. Often the trade unions in the home country of the TNC lead the way in the struggle for enforcement of workers’ rights regardless of where violations have occurred. If IFAs were simply a ‘scaling up’ of local and national bargaining, they would share a common ‘legitimated’ legal status with (sub)national collective agreements. While GUFs are increasingly being recognized by central managements who have signed IFAs, this is not equivalent to the status and role of local unions. Central management is under no legal obligation to enter into negotiations with a GUF. This is distinct from many national or sub-national frameworks that require management to bargain in good faith with a certified local union.
There are risks and benefits to the IFAs having such a weak basis in law. Clearly, the risk is that a TNC would blatantly violate the spirit and contents of an IFA, poisoning relations with trade unions throughout its operations. Additionally, TNCs could force suppliers and contractors to bid for contracts in a manner that would guarantee that fuel was poured onto the fire of labour rights violations. They could argue that although some suppliers are dependent on contracts from the TNC that had signed the IFA, they remain legally independent entities. Despite the trade unions’ claims that the TNC has a positive obligation to guarantee that CLS were upheld, there would be little legal recourse for trade unions or the GUFs if this type of situation evolved.
This tenuous legal status also has benefits in that the lack of circumscribed legal channels for dispute resolution means that a diversity of tactics is possible. One of the strengths of the IFAs is that the rights and obligations that are articulated in the documents are a ‘floor,’ leaving much room for upward mobility. The lack of legal status leaves room for a wide diversity of upward progress from the IFA. Not very much changes immediately after an IFA is signed. Implementation of the document requires the slow and arduous task of local organizing. The local struggles and building of trade unions that must occur for the IFA to be implemented are extremely diverse. The IFA does not limit the parameters of this diversity. A constrained legal interpretation of an IFA could constrain the diversity of local circumstances to which the document would apply.
Also, workers and trade unions are presently able to use the IFA in an activist manner. This means that everyone can use the document for political and moral purposes during organizing campaigns. If the IFAs shared the status of collective agreements, then workers would not be able to use the document in the same way. Rather, disputes and the administration of the outcomes of organizing campaigns would occur in courts and labour tribunals, far from the location where workers are organizing.
There is no clearly defined bargaining unit of workers that are covered by any of the IFAs. In contrast, local and national agreements are clear and explicit in their articulation of precisely who is covered by a given agreement. This is not the case with IFAs. These documents are designed to provide a framework within which a company and its suppliers operate. The complex and ever-changing ownership structures and sub-contracting practices of modern multinationals make such an approach necessary and extremely relevant to present practices. This means that in principle, everyone is covered by the IFA, but it also means that in practice there is not a clear list of who is covered.
The principle that everyone is covered by the IFA means that the clauses that have been negotiated apply to unorganized workers. This is another important distinction from local and national agreements. A few advanced capitalist countries have practices of sectoral bargaining where workers who are not organized are provided with the same working conditions as those who are members of trade unions, but these are exceptional. In general, workers who are members of trade unions gain the direct benefits of membership, while those who are not members gain only the indirect benefits. The IFAs inclusion of all workers, organized or not, is much broader than any of the nationally based legal class compromises.
Not everyone who is covered by an IFA is at the negotiating table yet. Due to the broad coverage of an IFA and the inclusion of unorganized workers, many workers do not yet know about IFAs. This leaves the process open to the criticism that it is ‘top-down’ rather than the local and national processes that are more driven from the bottom up.
This tension highlights one of the important possibilities associated with IFAs. These agreements are signed at senior levels of management, far from any shop floor. However, bargaining at the local and national level within the framework of the IFA is the goal, not a replacement of lower geographical levels of bargaining. The premise is that IFAs can deepen and improve regulation of the workplace, not replace other instruments. (Graham 2003) There is a strong argument that international bargaining may be necessary to defend and complement national efforts. (Hammer 2004) Dan Gallin argues that “There is no qualitative difference between local, national and international bargaining: bargaining at different levels is interconnected and forms a continuum.” Again, the purpose of the IFA is to complement and strengthen existing instruments rather than replace them. (Gallin 2005)
It is possible that IFAs may make a contribution to a nascent platform of international industrial relations in the future. That day has yet to come. The present context of global capitalism and international law requires the conclusion that IFAs do not have the same status as local or national bargaining agreements. The IFAs were not designed for this purpose. They were designed as an international-level complement to local and national levels of collective bargaining. Therefore, the argument that a simple ‘scaling up’ of collective bargaining to match the geographic scale of modern TNCs must be restrained.
4. Some of the Differences between International Framework Agreements and Corporate Social Responsibility
The impetus to negotiate framework agreements has gathered momentum as the terrain of regulation for TNCs has been gradually colonized by ‘corporate social responsibility’ initiatives (CSR). CSR initiatives are typically unilateral efforts to ‘self-regulate’. Such efforts are one of the most “prominent managerial developments of recent years.” (Gordon & Miyake 2000: 3) A superficial analysis of the similarities between ‘corporate social responsibility’ and IFAs as strategies to improve labour standards could suggest that neither appear to be binding documents like collective agreements, and thus the conclusion that they are similarly ineffective may seem justified.
Observed in the context of states that have been retreating from their historic regulatory roles, both CSR and IFAs could be seen as providing replacements to public regulation, thus contributing to a privatization of regulations. This privatization would offer different standards to different multinationals and workers – depending on which documents have been signed. Some authors have presented IFAs as one initiative that can be included under the umbrella of a broadly defined CSR. (Scherrer and Greven 2001: 78) An analysis of all of the existing framework agreements points towards the fundamentally different nature of these two instruments. (Müller & Rüb 2005: 26) CSR essentially offers a rhetoric of improving labour standards without the substance. The sceptical approach to understanding CSR observes these initiatives as a corporate response to bad publicity. These unilateral initiatives may also be introduced in order to avoid legislation, regulation, litigation or prosecution. (Gordon & Miyake 2000) Given that the legal construction of the corporation requires a pursuit of self-interest and systemic law breaking, (Bakan 2004) any claim to social responsibility made by a TNCs should be viewed with suspicion.
In a complementary vein, conservative publications and commentators claim that if CSR does exist, it should only be cosmetic because it is aimed at fixing what does not need fixed – the market is working just fine when it comes to delivering what people want. (The Economist 2005) Thus, CSR introduces distortions that are not representative of what people want – which, of course, only the market can effectively deliver. Additionally, the use of financial tools to measure social or non-financial goals is inherently contradictory (Justice 2003). Finally, there is also a free-market inspired argument that CSR may boost the profitability of some companies by improving their public reputation, internal human resources practices and worker retention strategies. (Little 2000) As a result, it becomes clear that such CSR efforts are aimed at improving profits, not improving labour standards.
The outcome of these related arguments is a broad set of CSR initiatives that contain several basic weaknesses. Most CSR schemes are unilateral, do not commit TNCs to accept unions, do not include suppliers and sub-contractors, contribute to a privatization of standards, may provide substitutes for independent unions, (Frundt 2004) fail to include specific language on basic labour standards, (Herrnstadt 2001) and often contain either no language or weak language on implementation. (Miller & Grinter 2003) There is an enormous degree of variation between these documents. (Gordon & Miyake 2000: 6) It will be shown that framework agreements are not subject to any of these weaknesses.
In the first instance, IFAs are negotiated documents, rather than unilateral initiatives. This is significant because independent workers’ representatives are involved from the start of the process. National unions (often with the support of the European Works Councils) and the GUFs are the signatories on the IFAs. Consequently, there is little foundation for an argument that IFAs are similar to CSR in the respect that they are aimed at improving a public image of non-compliance with core labour standards, rather than building a tool aimed at substantive improvement of those standards.
Next, a common feature of IFAs is a clear statement indicating a public commitment of signatories to a common set of principles. One of the key clauses that is consistently included across IFAs is the acceptance of unions in principle. An acceptance of unions is rarely included in unilateral statements of CSR. (Gordon & Miyake 2000) Often, public commitments that are included in CSR initiatives are simply statements that oblige the multinational to comply with existing relevant legal standards. In the context of states that have retreated (actively or passively) from their historic roles of regulatory enforcement, such CSR commitments hold little weight. The potential risks or costs associated with a public commitment to respect existing laws is low since any illegal practices would likely never be exposed or publicized by a state that has minimized enforcement efforts. Additionally, in the case of EPZs where denial of CLS is legally enshrined, a TNC may actively work to deny workers’ the right to organize independent unions while remaining in full compliance with relevant national laws. The IFAs clauses that obligate TNCs to accept unions in principle are distinct from the commonly used CSR approach aimed at compliance with national law. As noted in the previous section, many of the IFAs include this type of obligation for TNCs to respect relevant national laws, but the IFAs also go beyond this limited commitment.
Most of the IFAs that have been negotiated include language that provides some kind of responsibility for compliance with the IFA throughout the supply chain of the signatory TNC. It is expected that the relevant company will pressure suppliers who violate the clauses of the agreement to adhere to the terms outlined in the IFA. Pressure applied to suppliers could include warnings and active support for those suppliers who are genuinely interested in improving their compliance with CLS. There is language in some of the IFAs that eventually commits the TNC to terminate relationships with proven repeated violators of core labour standards. There is also language in some of the agreements which simply state that adherence to the CLS are an advantageous basis for a mutual relationship with the multinational. CSR initiatives rarely if ever commit the multinational to actively promote CLS throughout their supply chain and to back this promotion of CLS with substantive consequences for non-compliance.
One of the consequences of governments’ retreat from regulation and enforcement of CLS is the proliferation of ‘private standards’. Some of these private standards are the ‘Global Sullivan Principles of Social Responsibility’[4] and various CSR initiatives. There is increasing evidence that multinationals publicly claim compliance with a given set of principles outlined in their internal CSR policies. This provides TNCs with ‘evidence’ for the argument that legislation and enforcement are not really necessary. This is a strategy aimed at avoiding strong regulation. The presence of various standards allows multinationals to ‘regime shop’ and find the set of principles that fits most appropriately with their specific circumstances. A substitution effect that replaces government or public standards with private standards is thereby engendered. Additionally, multinationals will often use these company-specific efforts to build an ‘enterprise consciousness’, attempting to increase workers’ degree of identification with ‘their’ company.
IFAs avoid contributing to this privatization of regulation and risk of building ‘enterprise consciousness’ by maintaining the CLS at their core. Despite the fact that agreements are signed with individual companies, the GUFs are able to bring about a common commitment that focuses on a set of principles that is broader than any one company. Although there are differences in the strength of IFAs in their coverage of suppliers and sub-contractors, hours of work, health and safety or dispute settlement procedures, they preserve the CLS as their core. They perform a ‘norm-setting’ role (Müller & Rüb 2005: 5) where the norm is the floor of rights that are respected and where these norms are widely shared and respected internationally. The GUFs are contributing to the building of an underlying consensus on the ILO Core Labour Standards whereas there is more diversity within the CSR initiatives.[5] A unifying focus on a core set of rights is reproduced in the IFAs despite geographical borders. (Wills 2002)
Many CSR initiatives involve some kind of labelling system that facilitates public knowledge of the existence of the CSR policy. These efforts attempt to sell goods on the basis of them being ‘certified’ as sweatshop free, or child labour free, or some other kind of designation. Consumers are asked to purchase goods that are certified in this way. TNCs rely on consumers to ‘vote with their dollars or euros’ for the type of production practices that they support. There are several problems with this approach.
First, only those with sufficient dollars and euros are able participate in the ‘voting process.’ Second, the reliability of information provided by the TNCs that are marketing the products is questionable since the purpose of the organization is to maximize profits, not provide reliable information about labour standards to consumers. Third, such initiatives typically focus on a narrow conception of workers rights. For example, workers’ rights may be reduced to ‘no child labour,’ negating the importance of all of the other core labour standards. (Scherrer & Greven 2001: 109) Also, labelling strategies have the potential to take power away from workers. A displacement of independent unions could be engineered by a TNC through the involvement of ‘independent monitors.’ Through this mechanism, power would remain in the hands of consumers with enough dollars and euros to vote, rather than with workers and independent unions.
A related risk associated with CSR is the possibility of union substitution. (Frundt 2004) In this scenario, multinationals develop alternative dispute settlement mechanisms and internal corporate communication loops that may provide a substitute for independent unions. Workers may even be offered the opportunity to attend certain management meetings as part of the development of such ‘parallel means’ for the expression of workers’ collective interests. (Kearney & Justice 2003) This model may also aim to have outside, or ‘independent’ monitors and verifiers visit workers’ to observe their conditions and make judgements as to compliance with a given set of standards. Immediate questions concerning the legitimacy of outside monitors are commonly associated with the both labelling strategies and with this type of CSR. It is not uncommon for monitors to be trained as accountants from major international accounting firms. The appropriateness of the set of skills that such professionals bring to the job of observing and evaluating the extent that CLS are violated at a given workplace is questionable at best.
Most IFAs do not deal with verification or monitoring, but instead, are aimed at “creating the possibility for workers to enforce workers’ rights themselves.” (ICFTU 2001: 98) The self-activity of workers is the premise for the implementation of IFAs. Clauses that are present in IFAs related to monitoring and verification are relatively weak. This is because the emphasis is really on workers’ monitoring their own workplaces, typically through independent unions, rather than having an outside monitor provide an ‘independent’ assessment.
Perhaps Heinz Bendt articulated the relationship most clearly when he stated that “IFAs are negotiated on a global level but implemented locally.” (Bendt 2003: 72) This makes clear the purpose of IFAs. These agreements become useful when they open the space for workers to organize and bargain collectively. This is why the core conventions related to the right to organize (87) and the right to bargain collectively (98) are so important. Additionally, the inclusion of explicit reference to convention number 135 in nineteen of the IFAs (referring to workers’ representatives access to workplaces without discrimination) offers more evidence that the IFAs are about promoting and protecting space for local workers to organize and carry out trade union activities.
Dan Gallin, former IUF General Secretary has claimed that “the main condition for the successful implementation of an IFA is union strength on the ground, i.e. the presence of unions capable of monitoring the implementation of the agreement locally.” (Gallin 2005) The IFAs hold that the most effective monitoring is done by workers themselves. There are no substitutes for workers monitoring their own workplaces. (Justice 2003) Under these circumstances, questions concerning the legitimacy of monitors or verifiers are completely avoided. (Miller & Grinter 2003)
A climate for the rapid expansion of CSR policies clearly exists. An OECD study of 246 voluntary codes found that ‘labour’ was the most commonly referenced issue area[6]. (Gordon & Miyake 2000) Although IFAs are fundamentally different from this multitude of CSR initiatives that are presently proliferating, workers may be able to take advantage of the climate of CSR. (Riisgaard 2003) A few companies have agreed to sign IFAs and have later attempted to publicize this fact as part of their broader CSR strategy. Also, many of the IFAs that have been negotiated contain references to unilateral, internal CSR documents. This indicates a desire on the part of management to link the IFAs to their broader public relations exercises. While this may cause some confusion, it is difficult to avoid. When considering the argument that IFAs are no different than other CSR initiatives, or that IFAs are one form of CSR, it must be recognized that if the contribution of IFAs was limited to improving the public image or providing a marketing boost to companies, there would be as many IFAs signed as there are CSR initiatives. This is not the case.
Given the differences between IFAs and CSR that are outlined above, international framework agreements are not subject to the many weaknesses and faults that are inherent to the CSR policies. IFAs provide a much better tool to elevate the effectiveness of core labour standards than does CSR.
5. Criticisms of International Framework Agreements
In order to deepen the understanding of IFAs, some of the most important criticisms that have been levied against them must be considered. There are at least four key criticisms of IFAs. First, it can be argued that the core standards of the ILO that form the centerpiece of the agreements are not universally valid. Next, it may be argued that many of the IFAs are negotiated within the European Works Councils (EWCs) and so they are constrained by the same limitations that as these bodies. Also, the reach of IFAs is very small and no agreements have been signed in the garment, textile and footwear industries, which are known to be structured in a manner that promotes high degrees of exploitation. Finally, some commentators have made the case that IFAs are weak because they are not easily implemented, or made effective. These four significant criticisms will be dealt with in turn.
First, one of the strongest criticisms of IFAs is that they hold the ILO Core Labour Standards at their centre and these standards are not universally valid. The international tension and conflict over the universal validity of core labour standards is best depicted in the debate that has occurred at the WTO. As previously outlined, efforts have been made to introduce core labour standards into the realm of the WTO. Such attempts have met with fierce resistance by some countries of the South. The final declaration of the 1996 Singapore Ministerial meeting of the WTO stated:
We renew our commitment to the observance of internationally recognised core labour standards. The ILO is the competent body to set and deal with these standards, and reaffirm our support for its work in promoting them. We believe that economic growth and development fostered by increased trade and further trade liberalisation contribute to the promotion of these standards. We reject the use of labour standards for protectionist purposes, and agree that comparative advantage of countries, particularly low-wage developing countries, must in no way be put into question. (WTO 1996)
This WTO declaration was understood by many to be a clear rejection of any role in protecting CLS or punishing violators of the core conventions. The statement that the comparative advantage of low-wage countries must not be put into question could be understood as an implicit acceptance of low labour standards. The WTO position that is expressed in this statement suggests that economic development of a particular kind is necessary before CLS can be widely shared. Specifically, the position made clear by the WTO is that development must come before improvement of labour standards. This directly conflicts with the position that CLS are a necessary ingredient of development. The methods required to bring about an increase in CLS effectiveness are fundamentally different between the WTO and trade unions. (Paech 2003: 15) The responsibility for dealing with CLS was squarely placed with the ILO. Many critics of a WTO role in this realm were convinced that their introduction would result in detrimental effects for developing countries.
At this point, the universal validity of the ILO Core Labour Standards is often brought into question. There is a clear concern that “the push for global standards is a misguided attempt to force inappropriate developed-country labor institutions on less developed countries.” (Elliott 2003: 7) In contrast to this position, most of the more insightful commentators have instead chosen to focus on the dramatic imbalance of power within global institutions such as the WTO rather than on the validity of the CLS themselves. (Khor 2000) The “WTO is dominated by developed northern states which tend to reflect the interests of the northern political elites and dominant multinational firms.” (Wells 1998: 11)
Arguments against labour standards in principle are rarely made. However, it is often argued that the space for national policy making in developing countries has been eroded and that this erosion would continue to gain strength and momentum with the inclusion of labour standards at the WTO. This is not an argument against the universality or appropriateness of labour standards, but rather an argument that attempts to make power imbalances between the North and South clearer. Martin Khor, director of the Third World Institute has made the case that the “greater the range of issues to be taken up by the WTO, the more will the space for national policy-making (and development options) in developing countries be whittled away.” (Khor 2000)
Underlying Khor’s statement is a particular understanding of how national interests are constructed. If the interest of any nation is defined as the interests of ‘national elites’, then of course, a strengthening of workers’ rights would not be in the ‘national interest.’ Rohini Hensman has argued that a workers’ rights clause could actually strengthen the policy making arena of developing countries because it could offer them some protection from TNCs that threaten to relocate production if workers’ rights are protected. (2001: 438) In theory, a workers rights’ clause would guarantee that a certain ‘floor’ of rights was respected by all. One of the implications of Hensman’s argument is that this floor would apply to all countries, thus eliminating the threat of relocation, allowing governments a larger discretionary space for policy development.
Regardless of the universality of the CLS, there is evidence that their widespread promotion and adoption could strengthen the position of developing countries’ workers and governments vis a vis TNCs. Additionally, most studies of inward FDI and labour standards show that there is a negative correlation between low la standards and inward FDI flows. (Elliott 2003: 6) The argument that Khor makes against inclusion of CLS could be understood as a rejection of the CLS in principle, but it is not. Rather, it’s an argument against the power imbalances that are expressed and consistently rearticulated at the WTO. Resistance to core labour standards may become more understandable in the context of the WTO debate and developing countries’ weaker bargaining position within the WTO. There is no shortage of evidence that countries of the North have used the WTO to preserve advantage and power. Significantly, the position that the countries of the North would use labour standards in a manner similar to other bargaining strategies at the WTO misses the centrally important point that there are widespread violations of trade union rights in the North. This is particularly the case for the United States. (ICFTU 2004b)
While the U.S. may impose a cynical double standard through WTO channels, the clear violations offer countries of the South a solid ground for counterarguments. Violations have also been recorded throughout Eastern and Western Europe. (ICFTU 2004a) The United States or European countries could make the argument that violations in the South are widespread, while simultaneously repressing evidence of violations within their own borders, or preventing this information from entering the debate in the first instance. However, countries of the South could have a solid basis upon which to argue that violations are also occurring in the North.
The United States has ratified only two of the eight core ILO Labour Conventions. The U.S. ratified the convention on the worst forms of child labour in 2000, and the convention on forced labour in 1991, 34 years after it was introduced. This convention is constantly violated in the privately run, profit maximizing federal prison system. (Greenfield 2001) However, a qualification must be made. Many of the products that are manufactured in these private prisons never leave the U.S.. Thus, they would not be subject to the clauses of the WTO which only applies to goods and services traded across national borders. Therefore, the possibility of developing countries shining a light on ‘developed’ country violations of CLS at the WTO is significantly reduced.
Many countries behave as if compliance with CLS would threaten or harm their growth potential. (Elliott 2003: 6) Most of the available evidence points in the opposite direction. The OECD has reported that violations of CLS don’t increase competitiveness and adherence to labour standards does not reduce competitiveness. (Scherrer & Greven 2001: 34) A study prepared by the WTO makes the case even more clearly, concluding that where core labour standards are violated by export sectors, competitiveness is lower than in those areas where observance of CLS is present. (Maskus 1997) This is an argument that violation of core labour standards is not an economically sound basis for competitive advantage.
There is statistically significant evidence that U.S. FDI in particular is more attracted to countries that have ratified more ILO Conventions than to those that have ratified less. (Cooke & Noble 1998) Thus, contrary to the common understanding of many governments and employers, the increased presence of core labour standards may even be required for development to occur. (Scherrer & Greven 2001, Sengenberger 2002) In the economies of the Global South, TNCs often provide higher wages and better working conditions than local companies and are not preferentially attracted to countries with widespread violations of trade union rights. (Brown, D. et al. 2003) The evidence supporting the promotion and protection of CLS is increasingly conclusive. Argued in this manner, the maintenance of these ILO standards at the core of IFAs may become one useful tool to resolve the destructive and paralyzing tension over labour standards that has evolved at the international level.
The historic roots of core labour standards at the ILO are connected to the effort to take labour out of competition. Sengenberger 2002: 33) ILO Conventions 87 and 98 are ‘enabling rights,’ meaning that these core rights are a precondition for all others in the sense that they are the necessary tools that workers and unions require in order to strive for the improvement of working conditions. Thus, the CLS do not impose a particular model, but are inherently flexible due to the fact that the presence and articulation of these rights may take varied forms.
These standards maintain widespread validity because of the high number of ratifications that they have received. (Paech 2003: 13) Many countries have not ratified many of the core conventions, but “even if they have not ratified the Conventions in question, they have an obligation arising from the very fact of membership in the [International Labour] Organization to respect, to promote and to realize, in good faith and in accordance with the Constitution, the principles concerning the fundamental rights which are the subject of those Conventions” (ILO 1998) In some circumstances, countries that have ratified some conventions have been granted different, or more flexible time frames and special considerations to implement the conventions. Indeed, it is part of the ILO constitution to recognize and have ‘due regard’ for special circumstances.
(Sengenberger 2002:40)
Before any of the conventions ever reached the stage of ratifications, each was supported by at least 2/3 of the annual International Labour conference, which is composed of representatives from trade unions, government and business. (Scherrer & Greven 2001: 42) Significantly, this means that a broad agreement must have been reached before the ratification process began. Also, the ILO’s Declaration on the Fundamental Rights at Work “makes it clear that these rights are universal, and that they apply to all people in all States – regardless of the level of economic development” (ILO 2005b)
The ILO Core Labour Standards reach a high level of universality that is undeniable. One of the most important features that makes this possible is the fact that CLS are not substantive. For example, this means that they are not about imposing the German welfare state and its system of codetermination onto Malaysia, Nigeria or the United States. The CLS are not prescriptive or culturally specific, but are articulated in varied ways depending on political and economic context. The IFAs share this strength due to the fact that the CLS are found at the centre of these agreements.
Another principal criticism of IFAs is that they are negotiated within the European Works Councils, and so they are bound by the limitations of these bodies. Specifically, the EWCs only formally provide a mechanism for consultation with workers and potentially their trade unions. They do not provide workers with rights to codetermination or bargaining. Also, the EWCs leave workers who are not in export industries unaffected by their existence, only affecting the practice of companies operating in more than one European country. Although IFAs are negotiated at an elite level, often through European Works Councils, they are relevant and can be used by workers well beyond these institutions. The limitations of the EWCs are not the same for IFAs.
The European Trade Union Congress, (ETUC) envisions a long term project of European collective bargaining and industrial democracy evolving out of the progress of the EWCs. (Weston & Lucio 1997: 765) The basis for such optimism is difficult to find. The European Industrial Relations Observatory (EIRO) reports that a quarter of agreements forming EWCs were signed with ‘unspecified employee representatives’ only. This means that trade unions were in no way involved with roughly a quarter of the agreements establishing EWCs. In fact, trade unions are signatories on only 45% of agreements to establish EWCs. Thus, the role of trade unions in EWCs is unclear, and in no way secure.
EWCs have been introduced as one component of an expanding ‘social Europe’ that is built on a constantly rearticulated and reemphasized notion of ‘social partnership’. (Ramsay 1997) Resonant with ‘social partnership’, the EU Directive that brought EWCs into legal existence claims to “promote dialogue between management and labour” and to “inform and consult.” (Council Directive 94/45/EC: Preamble) In this instance, consultation means the “exchange of views and establishment of dialogue.” (European Commission 2.1,f) There are no rights to codetermination requiring the consent of an elected works council before any decision could be operationalized. In fact, only 2% of agreements that have been established require any type of negotiation at all. [emphasis added] (EIRO 1998) Negotiations, codetermination or bargaining with independent trade unions is clearly not a premise of the EWCs.
In distinct contrast, trade unions and GUFs are the most important and essential actors involved with the negotiation and implementation of the IFAs. Dan Gallin has pointed out that all negotiations should involve the maximum number of national unions. “A strong and effective IFA requires that all the unions in the given company should be involved from the beginning in all stages of the negotiation, then of the implementation, by means of an appropriate democratic structure. A top-down “IFA” is a sham (as is a CBA [Collective Bargaining agreement] negotiated behind the backs of the workers the negotiator purports to represent).” (Gallin 2005) While EWCs have a much stronger formal legal presence than IFAs, they do not aim to involve trade unions to the extent that Gallin highlights. One of the central focuses of all of the IFAs is to promote bargaining between private companies and independent trade unions.
As a consequence of the structures of the EWCs, Wills’ (2000) longitudinal study of one large EWC argued that it was really a forum for managers to report their decisions after they have been made, and then respond to criticism and concerns articulated by workers’ representatives. While the EWCs may prove to be a useful starting point and potential transitional instrument for coordinating bargaining across national borders, (Wells 1998: 4) it is difficult to identify progress towards European collective bargaining within this structure.
The Directive applies only to companies with over 1000 workers operating in more than one country (with at least 150 workers in each). As such, the scope of the Directive is limited to multinational firms, leaving the national systems of industrial relations for every other worker unaffected. In contrast, the IFAs apply in every country that a given TNC operates within. Also, the IFAs apply to many workers who are not working in TNCs. All of the IFAs are negotiated directly with TNCs, but thirty out of thirty-nine of them contain some language on suppliers. This means that many workers employed in small and medium sized domestic companies that are not exporting anything across national borders are covered by the agreement. For example, the supplier language of an IFA that a TNC with a subsidiary in Turkey had signed would apply to all workers in a small local Turkish company that is supplying that TNC. In this manner, the IFA applies to many companies that are not TNCs. This makes the scope of the IFAs significantly wider than the reach of the EWC directive.
EWCs are detailed and prescriptive legal constructions. TNCs that meet the criteria making the establishment of EWCs necessary have clear and specific rules that must be followed. There is little room for flexibility. One of the outcomes of this approach that imposes a particular legal model onto TNCs is that the EWCs have little effect. This is particularly the case for U.S. based TNCs that are affected by the EWC directive. Hoffmann et.al. (2002) have shown that the EWC model is often imposed onto U.S. and British companies with little effect. In part, this is explained by the exporting of industrial relations practices by American companies. U.S. TNCs often make every effort to avoid independent trade unions as they do at home. (Cooke & Noble 1998) Wal-Mart offers the clearest example of this practice. (Christopherson & Lillie 2004)
Unlike EWCs, IFAs do not attempt to impose a particular, prescriptive model into other contexts. Thus, potentially divisive debates in the international trade union movement about tactics and the risks or benefits of a particular mode of engagement can largely be avoided. No structural or ideological commitments other than a focus on CLS are required for trade unions to collaborate in the negotiation and implementation of an IFA. Also, trade unions operate within extremely diverse systems of industrial relations – despite the rhetoric of the homogenizing power of globalization. (Gitterman 2002) Decentralization and diversity fits extremely well with the IFA approach. This cannot be said for the EWC approach. This is an important benefit for trade unions because it means that all actors do not have to agree in order to collaborate.
IFAs are not bound by the same limitations as the EWCs despite the fact that several of them have emerged through the efforts of trade unions active in these bodies. EWCs do not provide a space for bargaining or negotiation whereas IFAs explicitly attempt to promote precisely this activity. Trade unions are not necessarily important for the EWCs whereas independent unions and their international organizations are the most important actors with IFAs. EWCs are limited to TNCs operating in more than one European country whereas the IFA applies to a much broader group of workers in TNCs and companies producing exclusively for the domestic consumption of those TNCs. Also, the EWC model imposes a specific set of rules whereas the implementation of IFAs fits extremely well with diverse trade unions operating in varied systems of industrial relations.
Another criticism of IFAs is that their reach is very small. Only thirty-nine agreements have been signed. This seems like a low number of agreements when the total number of TNCs is considered. Also, no agreements have yet been signed in the garment, textile and footwear industries. Both of these critiques of IFAs focus on the lack of workers who are covered by the agreements.
Thirty-nine IFAs is not a high number of agreements when placed in the context of the number of TNCs operating in the global economy who could potentially negotiate and sign. However, evidence suggests that IFAs are an increasingly popular instrument. Thirty-eight of the thirty-nine IFAs have been signed since the beginning of 2000. This indicates that a high priority has been placed on this process by the GUFs. The IFBWW has noted that the process to get an IFA negotiated and signed takes roughly two years. (IFBWW 2004) Roughly 4 million workers are directly covered by the IFAs that have been signed. This means that they work directly for the TNC that signed the agreement. This number increases dramatically upwards of 4 million when calculations of the number of workers covered includes those working for suppliers of TNCs that have signed IFAs containing language on suppliers. Considered in this manner, both the number of agreements signed and the number of workers covered by the agreements is actually high.
Observing this total number of agreements signed and number of workers covered indicates nothing about the sectors and workplaces that are effected. Many agreements have been achieved in supplier-driven and extractive industries. No agreements have been achieved in the garment, textile and footwear industries. This absence of agreements exists despite the adoption of a policy to actively pursue the negotiation and signing of IFAs at the 2000 World Congress of the International Textile, Garment and Leather Workers’ Federation, (ITGLWF). These industries are marked by highly complex buyer-driven supply chains where leading companies maintain little or no direct control over working conditions through the supply chain.[7] Doug Miller and Steve Grinter (2003) of the ITGLWF have highlighted at least three reasons that agreements have not been reached in these sectors.
First, many leading companies have overt, publicly stated anti-union orientations. Next, Miller and Grinter have noted the possibility of collective employer resistance to signing IFAs. Third, there is a marked oversupply of voluntary codes and regulations in these sectors. Miller claims that there are over 10 000 different ethical codes in the garment and footwear sectors alone. (2004) This indicates a wide variety of approaches to dealing with ‘social responsibility’ on the part of TNCs in these sectors. Also, TNCs are able to ‘shop’ around for the most favourable codes available, avoiding those that involve independent trade unions. (Miller 2004: 218)
Due to the lack of union organization in these sectors, negotiation of IFAs must focus on much stronger and more stringent monitoring and auditing than IFAs that are negotiated in sectors with higher trade union density. Perhaps this has also contributed to a lack of IFAs in these sectors because this type of language would be particularly difficult to achieve in these industries. Arguably, TNCs in the garment, textile and footwear sectors have more collective experience with voluntary regulation than any others. This has potentially contributed to a clearer and possibly collective position that they will not accept “global interference” in the running of the company. (Miller 2004: 232)
The last and perhaps most significant criticism of IFAs is that very little changes when an IFA is negotiated and signed. IFAs are not like collective bargaining agreements where clauses are clear in their obligations for all parties and are legally enforceable. This has led some to claim that the IFAs are ineffective. UNI’s Asia and Pacific Regional Secretary, Chris Ng has claimed that framework agreements are ineffective.((2001) His critique highlights the problem of mechanisms for supervision and implementation. Ng’s frustration with the slow progress of implementation of the IFAs is understandable. Implementation is a key problem with any kind of regulation. (Gordon & Miyake 2000)
The root of the implementation problem points to a potential key weakness of the IFAs. IFAs may be weak because they require the slow, difficult and often frustrating building of independent local trade union organizations as a prerequisite for their effective implementation. If GUFs and relevant affiliate unions do not engage this type of work before an agreement is signed, in order to guarantee that a strong agreement is negotiated with management, the language of the IFA will be weak. Similarly, if this slow and difficult work is not also engaged after an IFA has been signed, implementation of the agreement will obviously not be comprehensive. If the GUFs and affiliate unions do not commit to the often arduous organizing work before, during and after an IFA is signed, substantive contributions to improving workers’ rights using these agreements will be severely constrained.
The most important critiques of the IFAs are all understandable and contain some degree of legitimacy. First, the rejection of core labour standards at the WTO which was argued for by many delegates from the South is understandable in the context of the power imbalances within that institution. They are not an outright rejection of the CLS in principle. The ILO core standards reach an extremely high degree of universality. In the context of the number of TNCs operating in the global economy, the amount of IFAs signed to date appears small. However, the majority of these have been signed in the last five years, showing that they are an increasingly important and rapidly growing instrument. Also, the IFAs that have been negotiated in the context of the EWCs are not subjected to the same limitations as these institutions. The sector-specific characteristics of the garment, textile and footwear industries explains the lack of progress towards gaining IFAs in these areas. Finally, the frustration with the progress of the implementation of the IFAs is understandable due to the necessity of building the strength of independent trade unions on the ground in order to make the agreement strong and then, in order to make implementation of the IFA effective. This is typically a slow and arduous process where the risk of defeat is ever-present. The GUFs and affiliate unions must commit to this type of organizing work in order to make the IFAs an important tool that can be used to improve compliance with CLS.
6. Specific Contributions of International Framework Agreements
Based on this detailed depiction of IFAs and their potential weaknesses, an assessment of their specific possible contributions to increasing the efficacy of core labour standards must be explored. IFAs have only been in place for a short time. This means that any attempt to measure their substantive efficacy is severely constrained. There is not a lot of evidence that the IFAs have been used by local or national unions that is available in the public realm. It is difficult to ascertain the extent to which this is a problem of the lack of recording and publicizing the use of IFAs or a problem of communication and knowledge building to spread the fact that workers are covered by the IFA, thus limiting their use. Perhaps both of these related problems contribute to the present lack of available evidence.
The evidence that does exist provides the foundation for a strong argument that these agreements can be extremely useful. There are two comprehensive assessments of the practical use of IFAs. The first is the work of Jane Wills who evaluated the agreement between the Accor global hotel chain and the International Union of Food, Agricultural, Hotel, Restaurant, Catering, Tobacco and Allied Workers’ Associations (IUF). The second study is an ILO working paper that evaluates the IUF/COLSIBA – Chiquita framework agreement. It is an ILO Working Paper by Lone Riisgaard. Additionally, the IFBWW has written an assessment of the manner in which their agreements are being used by themselves and their affiliate unions.
These authors agree that the IFAs offer a complement to other levels of bargaining rather than a substitute. Dan Gallin has stated that “the purpose of an IFA is not to substitute international collective bargaining to local or national level bargaining, but to open up spaces at national and local level to facilitate and protect bargaining at that level.” (Gallin 2005) In other words, the IFA is designed to open “a space for affiliated unions to consolidate their rights in the company and negotiate their national or local agreements under more favourable conditions.” (Gallin 2005) The strong focus on the inclusion of Conventions 87 and 98 on the right to organize and bargain collectively highlight this intention. Nobody knows the priorities of local issues as intimately as local workers and trade unionists. Practical use of an IFA embraces the diversity of issues that exists between workplaces. It offers support to workers at the local level to define and pursue their most important issues in a broader context of heightened mutual support. Additionally, in circumstances where there are no unions, IFAs can help to create what Don Wells has called ‘coordinative pre-bargaining’ (Wells 1998: 9) where communication between a nascent local union and management can begin under better conditions than what existed before the IFA was signed.
There is an implicit assumption in these arguments that effective pressure can be applied from above. There is a strong and central role for the GUFs in supporting local struggles by demanding that senior managers at a relevant TNC guarantee compliance with the document they signed. Twenty-one of the IFAs create another seat at the table for labour by having GUFs recognized by TNCs. This establishes a precedent for global negotiations. (Müller & Rüb 2005: 27) In many of the instances where the relevant GUF is not specifically named, ‘employee representatives’ are often referred to in the IFAs.
Through the trade union representatives of affiliated unions, the GUFs maintain a strong, although less formal route to the
negotiating table. In this way, unions are able to build what Wills refers to as a “multi-scalar strategy” that allows the GUFs to actively support locally based (and controlled) organizing and bargaining efforts. An ongoing relationship between the TNC and the GUF is established. In effect, this means that there is an increased capacity for intervention during a given dispute. Workers and their representatives are already inside and can therefore raise the issue with central management and potentially solve a dispute as it is occurring. This strategy may provide a potential route around recalcitrant local or even national management (Wills 2001)
As noted in the previous section, not much changes immediately after an IFA is signed. Getting employers to recognize an independent union and to sit at the negotiating table still requires (and will continue to require) a mobilized local group of workers demanding their rights. There is now some evidence that such groups of workers have been able to use the IFAs to support local organizing. Gallin argues that the presence of an IFA “helps organize a company operations where unions did not previously exist.” (Gallin 2005) This is the case for workers who used the UNI – Carrefour agreement to solve local disputes in Korea and Turkey. Also, The ICEM – Statoil agreement has been used in Nigeria, the U.S. (ICFTU 2001: 100) and Poland. To date, there are eight cases of the IMF – DaimlerChrysler IFA being used for accessing suppliers. (Müller & Rüb 2005: 22)
Several affiliates of the IFBWW have reported breakthroughs using the IFAs. Polish affiliates have been able to organise nine IKEA-owned companies in that country. The Malaysian timber union has also organised two IKEA suppliers. North American affiliates have been using the ICEM agreements with Skanska and Hochtief to establish unions at construction sites where the right to organize was previously being denied. Also, workers representatives have been elected in Faber Castell factories in both Malaysia and China. (IFBWW 2004) Additionally, farm workers on banana plantations in Honduras, Ecuador and Colombia (Riisgaard 2003) and hotel workers in the UK, New Zealand, Canada, Indonesia the U.S. and various African countries (Wills 2002) have all used IUF framework agreements to support local organizing efforts.
Another specific contribution that IFAs have the potential to make is an erosion of the notion that jobs are good in the North and bad in the South. As IFAs are used in the process of bringing attention to violations everywhere (as those noted above), the divisions between North and South can be actively eroded. Dan Gallin argues that all of the “IUF IFAs apply equally to all operations of a company, North or South, East or West. Of course an IFA will benefit in the first instance the weaker unions in the company (usually, but not always, in the South) through the support of the stronger unions (usually in the North).” (Gallin 2005) There is no discrimination in any of the IFAs regarding how they are used or by whom. Significantly, U.S. unions are increasingly discovering IFAs as an organizing tool (Müller & Rüb 2005: 19)
Gallin notes the reality of the ‘usual’ situations where stronger unions in the North are supporting weaker unions in the South. However, this the same as charity of rhetorical solidarity. Rather, it provides an example of what French has described as “one of those interests which they have in common…to fortify the weak parts of the common world front of workers against employers.” (French 2002:459) This means that everyone has a common interest in supporting the trade union work of those who are most targeted by the aggressive strategies of TNCs and governments. Practical use of the IFAs brings exactly this kind of understanding to the front of international trade union work.
In a related manner, Wills makes the case that active use of the IFAs can lead to an integration of an international dimension into the daily work of unions. Courses on ‘Global Solidarity’ and globalization in general are often marginalized in trade union education. Courses concerning the urgent daily work of the union, (e.g. skills development for bargaining, health & safety training or grievance handling) are often given priority. In order to counter the secondary status given to international dimensions of trade union work, the IFA could play a role. The IFAs make the connections between workers in various locations clear and may also give workers and unions something more concrete to work with in their international work. The IFAs offer a ‘concrete tool’ for international trade union work. (Müller & Rüb 2005: 10, Yilmaz 2005) Their use in practice makes an immediate contribution to unions building trust and learning from each other as they interact. This creates an important learning ground for unions engaging in the international sphere.
Finally, the IFAs provide a strong basis for dialogue. Whereas structures built under the premise of CSR initiatives rarely if ever support a basis for dialogue, the IFAs do have this possibility. This dialogue could be at the various, multiple scalar levels of engagement. Dialogue should always be approached with caution. However, there is a strong argument that the IFAs may provide a fairly direct route to better understanding corporate structure and supply-chain/sub-contractor relationships and how these are managed. This information is of central importance when unions are identifying points of political weakness and possibilities for strategic organizing campaigns.
A general consensus that three factors are of decisive importance for the successful implementation of an IFA is evolving in the critical literature. The first factor is knowledge. Knowledge about the agreement includes everyone throughout a company, suppliers, sub-contractors, workers and unions. The IFBWW claims that:
The most important part of the implementation process is that these agreements must be given meaning and life by appropriate information and education campaigns that will ensure that the workers affected by the agreement are aware of its existence and the meaning of its content. (IFBWW 2004)
Widespread knowledge is a basic premise for any informed action. Organizing efforts are supported if workers know about rights that a given employer has publicly committed to respect. A second critical factor is resources. Adequate resources must be available for workers to travel and attend meetings and communicate with each other. Also, multinationals must provide enough resources to build compliance with the IFA internally and with suppliers. Third, the IFA must be accepted by workers and unions. The acceptance and active cooperation of workers and unions is fundamental to successful implementation. Again, the IFBWW has stated that:
The success of any global company agreement will depend on the strength of the unions at the national level and full implementation of the global agreements is only possible when workers are organised in free trade unions and are able to bargain collectively at the national and enterprise level. (IFBWW 2004)
The notion that any of the GUFs have the capacity to implement any of the IFAs without the support and cooperation of workers and trade unions does not make sense. All three of these factors need to be met in order to build successes out of the IFAs. The question of to what degree these factors must be met remains open. IFAs clearly bring a lot of potential to the ongoing struggle to increase the effective actualization of the core labour standards. An example of making CLS more effective and bringing the potential of the IFAs into reality is detailed in the following section.
7. The Case Study of Ditaş
The best assessment of any type of agreement comes from its effectiveness when workers attempt to organize independent unions. (Frundt 2004, Tørres & Gunnes 2003: 3) The case study of a Turkish automotive parts producer named Ditaş offers strong evidence that IFAs can play a central role in assisting workers efforts to gain recognition of their trade union. Ditaş management fired the entire workforce of 400 workers the day after they submitted an application to the Labour Ministry requesting certification of their union at this workplace. Birleşik Metal-İş (Union of United Metal Workers) is the trade union that represents workers at this factory and it is extremely independent. It is affiliated to DİSK (Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions of Turkey). Unfortunately, the act of firing workers that are organizing independent trade unions is not without precedent in Turkey. While trade union rights are formally recognized, they are often violated in practice.
Turkey is often described as a ‘transitional’ country. This description may hold more true for Turkey than for other countries that receive the same designation. Turkey is the only country in the world to literally bridge the division between two continents, providing the geographical transition between Asia and Europe. Although the vast majority of Turkey is in Asia, previous and present governments of Turkey have attempted to negotiate entrance into and full membership in the European Union. This process has been ongoing for at least forty years. As these negotiations have progressed, many EU countries have applied pressure on Turkey to improve internal ‘democracy.’ Presumably, this includes respect for trade union rights.
Modern trade unions developed in Turkey around the same time as industrialized countries. Independent workers’ organizations emerged around the turn of the century. The first trade union laws in Turkey were not introduced until 1947, when workers were granted restricted rights to organize independent unions. Five years after these laws were introduced, Turkey signed ILO Convention 98 on the right to organize and bargain collectively. It was not until 1964 that a more general right to organize unions was protected in Turkish national law and many of the restrictions on membership were removed. The right to organize was granted from above, without struggle. It was presented as a necessary component of the modernization of Turkey. (Nichols, Sugur & Demir 2002: 31) Article 52 of the Turkish Constitution (1982) stipulates that organising in aunion is a fundamental right of all Turkish workers and that no one can be forced to resign membership in a trade union. The right to strike is also protected in this section of the Constitution. Additionally, Turkey signed on to ILO Convention 87 on the freedom of association in 1993. Clearly, the right to organize unions is now well established in Turkish law.
Protection of the right to organize on paper contrasts starkly with efforts to exercise this right in practice. A military coup in the fall of 1980 brought severe restrictions on the political and organizing activities of trade unions. The right to organize was completely denied to all public sector workers. (Nichols, Sugur & Demir 2002: 32) All offices of trade union federations except for the largely collaborationist Türk-Iş (Confederation of Trade Unions of Turkey) were closed down. Due to anti-democratic practices, Türk-Iş was temporarily suspended from membership in the ICFTU during the military dictatorship. Previous to the military coup, Türk-Iş had been a recipient of large amounts of U.S. financial aid and is often regarded as a U.S. type of union. (Nichols, Sugur & Demir 2002: 25) Along with widespread and systemic denial of trade union rights and arrests of trade union leaders, the military dictatorship also brought a rapid change from import substitution industrialization to export oriented economic development.
The more radical confederation known as DİSK was treated extremely harshly by the military government. Many trade unionists from affiliates were imprisoned and some were murdered. (Nichols, Sugur & Demir 2002, Lange 1998) DİSK remained banned until 1991. This confederation was founded in 1967 when several unions left Türk-Iş. It presently has 26 affiliated unions, and reports a membership of roughly 325 000[8]. (Lange 1998) During the 1970s DİSK was “at the centre of a militant socialist trade unionism. Today it adopts a rather less radical stance but it is still regarded as leftwing among the federations.” (Nichols, Sugur & Demir 2002: 25) This is the confederation to which the members of Birleşik Metal-İş at Ditaş are affiliated to. Birleşik maintains a membership of close to 60 000 workers. Similar to the confederation, Birleşik is considered to be more independent and militant than available alternatives.
The most important alternative to Birleşik is a union known as Türk Metal. Operating in the same sectors of the economy, these two unions have often competed for members[9]. Türk Metal is much larger than Birleşik, with a membership of roughly 200 000 workers and it is affiliated to the centre-right confederation, Türk-Iş. One in-depth study of the opinions of workers who were members of Türk Metal highlighted the fact that workers’ “criticism of the union is often focused on its lack of responsiveness to workers’ needs, lack of internal democracy and dialogue.” (Nichols, Sugur & Demir 2002: 31) The leadership of Türk Metal supported the 1980 military coup. In 1982 the union suspended its International Metalworkers’ Federation (IMF) membership on the grounds that the IMF had designated the military coup in 1980 as ‘anti-democratic.’ (Lange 1998) Türk Metal still remains unaffiliated to the IMF. Presently, about 16 per cent of workers in Turkey are unionized, out of a total workforce of approximately 24 million. Turkey maintains a “poor rights record” according to the ICFTU’s Annual Survey of Violations of Trade Union Rights.
(ICFTU 2004)
Ditaş is a major sub-contractor in Turkey. At the time of the dispute, they were supplying products to Isuzu, Chrysler, Ford Automotive and Mercedes Benz–Turkish. While maintaining a near monopoly domestically, the company was also selling automotive parts to companies in Europe, the U.S., North Africa and the Middle East.
Ditaş was taken over by Doğan Holdings in 1992[10]. From this date onwards, the new owners adamantly refused to recognize the union. Workers at this plant were without a union for eight years. Several unions attempted to organize during this period, but all efforts ended in failure. Birleşik successfully organized the entire workforce of 400 in December 2000 and this was the first instance in Turkey of workers’ organizing in the automotive parts supplier industry. (IMF 2002) An application for an authorization licence was made by Birleşik to the Labour Ministry on December 18, 2000. On December 19 Ditaş fired the entire workforce. This act was a blatant violation of Turkish labour law. Workers and union representatives immediately camped out at the front of the plant and initiated legal actions. This campaign was not sustained because the union did not have official recognition, and so could not call, organize or sustain a legal strike.
Workers from Ditaş and their union Birleşik did not give up. Rather, they reorganized and began a recognition strike in July 2002. According to Ron Blum, Director of the Automotive Department at the IMF, who was involved in this dispute, the demands of the union were straightforward: “union recognition and engaging the company in negotiation of a collective agreement for the workers.” (Blum 2005) Birleşik also demanded that fired workers be reinstated. The goals of the company were equally clear-cut. From the perspective of the union, the company wanted “to run the company free from the union.” (Yilmaz 2005) This was an extremely difficult eight-month strike that ended with recognition of Birleşik and the negotiation of a collective agreement. Gaye Yilmaz, who was involved in the dispute in her capacities as the person responsible for the International Department of Birleşik Metal-İş during the dispute noted that:
The legal stages took a very long time and this increased the endurance of the company. Since the very beginning, the union also took a number of steps to get support from international organizations such as the IMF, EMF [European Metalworkers’ Federation] and other brother unions abroad. However this was also a very slow process and the style of work was totally different. In the meanwhile striking workers were faced with hunger and they had a very hard winter. The union tried to do its best during these 8 months by providing food and fuel to them. There were also a number of small financial contributions from abroad. The children of some striking workers had to stop their education. At least 4 or 5 organizing staffs from the headquarters of the union stayed with striking workers and motivated them along the strike.
The dispute was specifically highlighted by the ICFTU’s 2004 Annual Report because Ditaş management offered increased wages to the 400 striking workers on the condition that they renounce their membership in Birleşik. (ICFTU 2004a) The company attempted to restart production during the strike. Turkish labour law also makes this act clearly illegal. This section of the law was upheld and the company was prevented from moving parts. It is significant that such a prominent Turkish company clearly felt that it could maintain such a comprehensively organized and blatantly illegal approach when it comes to the recognition of independent trade unions. Yilmaz stated that:
Although it was a very long and painful process both for the union and Ditaş workers, the consequence was a real victory and motivation for all workers who were employed by subcontractors. Because Ditaş was the first example in the Metal Sector in Turkey that a union succeeded to organize workers of subcontractors even though they work for such a powerful group of companies. The most important success factor in this process was that the workers and union believed in the victory at the end.
Clearly this group of workers and their union were committed to victory. For the first few months of the strike, Birleşik did not know the destination of the parts that were being produced at the plant. The connection between Ditaş and DaimlerChrysler was discovered in the third or fourth month of the strike. The IMF had requested that Birleşik find out which companies had contracts with Ditaş. Workers at Ditaş were able to discover that DaimlerChrysler facilities were one of the destinations for the parts that they had produced. In this way, Birleşik and the IMF confirmed that DaimlerChrysler was an important customer of Ditaş.
The IFA between the World Employee Committee of DaimlerChrysler (on behalf of the IMF) and the company was signed at Auburn Hills in September of 2002. The language that is in the agreement relevant for suppliers states that:
DaimlerChrysler supports and encourages its suppliers to introduce and implement equivalent principles in their own companies. DaimlerChrysler expects its suppliers to incorporate these principles as a basis for relations with DaimlerChrysler. DaimlerChryslerregards the above as a favorable basis for enduring business relations.
This language does not establish a clearly binding requirement that suppliers uphold the agreement to the extent that DaimlerChrysler did. However, the language proved crucial as an entry point for the World Employee Committee to make the case that DaimlerChrysler management make clear that they expect their suppliers to uphold the core labour standards.
According to Ron Blum, the strategy of the IMF was: “First, to issue a circular letter requesting solidarity support from IMF affiliates. Second, to work with the DaimlerChrysler World Employee Committee (DC WEC) in an effort to ensure that the supplier provision of the international framework agreement was respected.” This process led to the “nature of the dispute and the remedy [being] communicated from Birleşik Metal-İş to the IMF, then to the DaimlerChrysler World Employee Committee and onto DaimlerChrysler management, which investigated the case and based on the facts acted in accordance with respect of the IFA.” (Blum 2005) Crucially, if DaimlerChrysler portrays a commitment to upholding the code, suppliers will increasingly be forced to listen.
It was not a simple process to compel DaimlerChrysler to engage with the case. Initially, the company claimed that they could not require Ditaş to uphold the right of workers to organize. It took several months to bring this dispute to a positive resolution. It was partially through IMF insistence that DaimlerChrysler maintains some responsibility for CLS at their suppliers that Ditaş management eventually acted in accordance with the IFA.
International support played a central role in the successful outcome of the Ditaş strike.
International support and solidarity particularly showed by the IMF had three vital impacts: 1) The company management had to respect the union and 2) The union headquarters had an opportunity to train itself on how to organize an international campaign for trade union rights and 3) Ditaş workers realized the importance of knowing or checking the trade relations, clients, imports and export activities of the plant where they work. (Yilmaz 2005)
These various overlapping benefits outlined by Yilmaz are of increasing importance in the context of an intensifying globalization of TNCs and their supply networks. The collective learning at all levels that resulted from direct experience with use of the IFA builds the competence and skills of trade unionists engaged with these TNCs and their contractors in the North and South.
The importance of the IFA to this dispute cannot be overstated. Yilmaz claims that “the framework agreement signed between DaimlerChrysler and the IMF was the most important factor that brought an end to the strike.” (Yilmaz 2005) Erich Klemm, who was chairman of the DaimlerChrysler World Employee Committee at the time of the Ditaş dispute, stated that “the significance of the IFA cannot be overestimated, nor that of the IMF as a full partner in this agreement and its implementation. ”(IMF 2003)
Additionally, IMF General Secretary, Marcello Malentacchi, stated that “it is clear fundamental workers’ rights were achieved at Ditaş not only due to the hard work of the union but also the backup of our framework agreement at DaimlerChrysler. We will continue to pursue IFAs in transnational companies where our affiliates have members.” (IMF 2003) Finally, Ron Blum stated that the “solidarity support of affiliates, along with the IMF-DaimlerChrysler World Employee Council efforts to urge DaimlerChrysler management to ensure respect of the supplier provision of the IFA” (Blum 2005) were the most significant factors that led to the resolution of the strike.
Birleşik Metal-İş was recognized by Ditaş management and signed an agreement with a duration from March 10, 2003 until December 31, 2005. However, some of the workers were never rehired by management. “The company had maintained that it could no longer provide jobs for all the workers and that it had to lay off 200.” (IMF 2003) This would have been roughly half of the workforce. Ditaş claimed that there was not enough work at the plant to sustain previous employment levels. Yilmaz argues that this was a strategic decision on the part of management, since they had moved production of many parts to other factories under their control in an effort to minimize the importance of the unionized plant. (Yilmaz 2005) Under increasing pressure, the company relented and agreed to hire back the majority of workers. However, “75 workers still lost their jobs.” (ICFTU 2004a) Many of these workers had been strong supporters of previous organizing drives and the eight-month strike. (Yilmaz 2005) Birleşik made every effort that it could to find new jobs for these workers.
The struggle at Ditaş is continuing. Recently, Ditaş management has made a number of efforts to force Ditaş workers to leave Birleşik Metal and to become members in a “yellow union.” (Yilmaz 2005) Yilmaz argues that there is a strong probability that Türk Metal showed up at Ditaş by “invitation of the company management (it usually happens that way).” Türk Metal’s efforts to represent Ditaş workers in 2005 ultimately failed and Birleşik remains the sole union at the plant.
The organizing context for Birleşik Metal-İş and Ditaş workers shows little prospect of improving. Turkey’s possible ascension into the European Union[11] has not offered much motivation for improved respect of CLS in the country. Turkey introduced a new set of labour laws in the summer of 2003, shortly after the Ditaş dispute was concluded. Changes included the requirement that workers wanting to join or leave a trade union had to have this recorded by a lawyer and must pay for this service. Additionally, any candidates for union office must have at least ten years seniority in the relevant sector where the union is organized and must also be a Turkish citizen. Trade unions must obtain official permission to organise meetings or rallies, and must allow the police to attend their events and record the proceedings. If a union ‘seriously’ contravenes the laws governing its activities, it can be forced to suspend its activities or enter into liquidation on the order of a labour tribunal. (ICFTU 2004)
Birleşik Metal-İş General Secretary, Selçuk Göktaş has claimed that he doesn’t “believe that joining the EU will liberate Turkish workers…the government’s proposed changes to trade union laws in Turkey are not positive as they do not provide answers to our demands.” (IMF 2004) Protection of core labour standards in Turkey is not an easy task. Lobbying strategies by Birleşik and their confederation, DİSK aimed at changing some of these laws that were conceived during military dictatorship will continue. However, the list of key ingredients for the struggle to uphold basic rights maintains the same major components that such efforts always have; committed struggle on the ground supplemented by strategic international intervention and solidarity. There are no substitutes or short-cuts. In this case, it is clear that that the IFA signed with DaimlerChrysler was of central importance to the successful international intervention that took place.
8. Conclusions and Recommendations
It is clear that corporate power has experienced a recent and intense period of ascension. The consequences of this significant increase in power are equally apparent. More competition between workers everywhere and increasing inequality within and between the global North and South are two of the most immediately obvious outcomes. Many governments have largely retreated from their regulatory and protective roles in the arena of workers’ rights. Often, this retreat forms one component of an undisguised attempt to attract foreign capital.
Workers have constantly battled to improve their conditions. Strategies to do so have evolved as economic and political opportunity structures have changed over time. The IFAs are an example of an increasingly important instrument aimed at protecting a minimum set of rights. They provide one tool in the repertoire of workers and their representatives used in efforts to make the ILO Core Labour Standards more a description of reality rather than a normative statement. The manner in which these agreements are used in practice is up to local and international trade unionists.
IFAs only become valuable when there is a strong commitment to organizing ‘on the ground’ on the part of local trade unionists. (Miller & Grinter 2003: 114) Without this commitment, the framework of a floor of common rights is of little use. When the commitment to organizing is present, IFAs may increase the efficacy of core labour standards by contributing to the international co-ordination of workers’ and unions’ local efforts to enforce their own rights. This must be understood as an “on-going and long-term process.” (IFBWW 2004)
In order to enlarge the number of instances of successful use of IFAs, information about these agreements must be increased. Basically, more workers must become aware that the documents exist. As the Ditaş case dramatically illustrates, there is no shortage of evidence that workers are willing to organize, take risks, and try to improve their own situation. If more workers know about IFAs, more support for their efforts to organize themselves and demand their rights can be offered. Yilmaz (2005) has recommended that the IMF (and presumably the other GUFs) “could organize a training programme for trade unionists particularly on how to gather information about clients and countries involved in exporting and/or importing and how trade unions can use IFAs as a new tool for organizing.” (Yilmaz 2005) In addition to the establishment of training programs, all IFAs should include explicit language that management has a clearly defined responsibility to make workers aware of the existence of the IFA in relevant local languages. Such a clause would need to be followed up systematically and this follow-up could provide an additional inducement for affiliate unions to keep in contact with their GUF.
Clauses that aim simply to require information sharing would also be beneficial. In circumstances where there are no unions to contact within the supply chain of a TNC, a starting point could be found through the use of an IFA if the agreement required the disclosure of information about a given TNCs subcontracting chain or network. This would give trade unions and the GUFs a solid ground upon which to map production practices and to establish contact with both organized and unorganized workers supplying the TNC.
Additionally, it may be possible to negotiate the attachment of IFAs into some collective agreements. This has been occurring in the European textile industry with codes of conduct since 1997. (EIRO 1997) Inclusion of IFAs in collective agreements may offer a route to legal recourse in the case of violations of the negotiated terms. The GUFs could also negotiate a ‘choice of jurisdiction’ clause into the IFAs that would give recourse to a local court, or labour tribunal. The ILO could provide such a jurisdiction for the administration and settlement of disputes. In all cases, regardless of where disputes may be heard, the ILO should have what is called ‘persuasive jurisdiction’ for interpretation of the core labour standards. This is not a legally binding interpretation of the CLS, but it is often used to develop context in various legal systems. Such a statement should also be included in the IFAs.
Finally, the GUFs could include clauses that guaranteed relevant Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) recognition from the signatory TNC. In this way, unions could help NGOs get a seat at the table, beside trade union representatives and across from management. NGOs are sometimes extremely well placed to gather information on violations of CLS, particularly in cases where independent trade unions are absent. This could potentially strengthen links between union ‘insiders’ and NGO ‘outsiders’ who are all working on achieving the same goals. A step in this direction has already occurred in the ICEM – Rhodia agreement where the company “asserted its willingness” to develop constructive dialogue with community and NGO actors.
IFAs are an area of political contestation, (Jenkins 2001) not a solution to the increasingly evident problems caused by the present phase of capitalist globalization. They offer one more tool to be strategically used in ongoing efforts to support workers that are asserting their rights. IFAs do not substitute for other levels of bargaining between TNCs and unions. They provide an international complement to local and national bargaining. Similarly, the presence of IFAs does not release governments from their regulatory responsibilities. IFAs don’t substitute for government regulation and thus don’t cause there to be less regulation. Rather, they are one element that it is possible to use when developing strategies to deal with increasingly common government deregulation.
While IFAs are fundamentally different than the weak and unenforceable multitude of CSR initiatives, they are not as strong as local or national collective bargaining agreements. There is very little evidence that international or regional collective bargaining is developing. However, practical use of IFAs does provide a solid ground upon which to build further common agendas between trade unionist in different parts of the world in the future.
The increasing use of IFAs brings the role and functions of the GUFs into sharper focus. In the context of increasing intensity and extensiveness of the globalization of TNCs, the possible contributions of the GUFs have shifted towards more substantive contributions to global coordination and mobilization of affiliated unions. (Fairbrother & Hammer 2004) In this manner, the IFAs offer one instrument that can be effectively used to improve the efficacy of core labour standards despite dominant trends in the present phase of global capitalism.
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Appendix 1
International Framework Agreements concluded between Transnational
Companies and Global Union Federations
* The employee figures are mainly taken from the respective company’s website. The overview shows the number of employeeswho are directly employed by a company. Most agreements have also effects on sub-contracting companies and suppliers. In these cases the number of people affected by the agreement is of course higher.
Taken from the International Metalworkers’ Federation (IMF) web site.
www.imfmetal.org

Appendix 2
Comparative Analysis of International Framework Agreements
[1] Export Processing Zones (EPZs) provide an important exception to the widespread official recognition of this core set of rights. Workers’ right are often explicitly denied by law in this type of working environment. Additionally, the growing informal sector in many of the economies in the Global South & North provide another example where governments abdicate responsibility for upholding these core labour standards.
[2] Convention 135 (1971; Ratified by 66 states) refers to worker representatives not being discriminated against and having access to carry out their representative functions in the workplace.
[3] Convention 155: Occupational Safety and Health (1981; Ratified by 31 states) Addresses steps to be taken to prevent accidents and injury to health. Convention 1: Hours of Work (Industry)(1919; Ratified by 52 states) Addresses the length of the working week. Convention 95: Protection of Wages (1949; Ratified by 96 states) Addresses payment of wages regularly and in legal tender, directly to workers.
[4] The ‘Global Sullivan Principles of Social Responsibility’ were accepted and adopted by US companies doing business in South Africa in the apartheid era instead of participating in a boycott which may have risked their investments. (Jenkins 2001: 9)
[5] An OECD study of voluntary CSR initiatives indicated that of the 246 codes examined, only 10% of these made mention of ILO standards. (Gordon & Miyake 2000: 15)
[6] Although labour was the most common issue area to appear in these documents, there was a high degree of diversity in the manner that fundamental workers’ rights were treated. (Gordon & Miyake 2000: 7)
[7] One estimate calculated that over 300 000 suppliers are operating in this sector in developing countries. (Miller 2004) While this number has certainly been reduced with the end of the Multi-Fiber Agreement (MFA), the structures and complexities of the supply chains have not changed markedly.
[8] It is difficult to find accurate membership numbers for any trade union in Turkey. There is a strong structural incentive for unions to
overstate membership numbers. In order to gain official recognition from the Labour Ministry, a trade union must show that it represents
more than ten percent of workers in the relevant industry as well as more than fifty percent of workers at any given organized workplace.
[9] While these two unions compete for members in the same workplace, Turkish labour law requires that only one union be recognized at a
time at any given workplace.
[10] The Doğan group of companies is very powerful in Turkey. It operates in various sectors of the economy including media, financial services, tourism, industry, trade, energy and telecommunications. It is the best known media company in Turkey. Net sales for the group in 2004 was 4.5 million USD. Over 15 000 workers are directly employed by the Doğan Group. (Business Monitor International 2005)
[11] The increasing probability off success for Nicolas Sarkozy’s presidential aims in France and those of Angela Merkel in Germany pose a direct threat to Turkey joining the EU. Both of these right-wing leaders have publicly stated that they do not support full membership in the EU for Turkey, but rather, some sort of ‘special relationship.’