FREEDOM HOUSE REPORT: UNIONS FACE HOSTILE WORLD;
U.S. RATED ‘MOSTLY FREE’ BUT SHARPLY CRITICIZED
By Mark Gruenberg
PAI Staff Writer
NEW YORK (PAI)--Unions face a largely hostile world, with dozens of countries repressing their workers’ rights, a new major report says.
The study, by New York-based Freedom House, rates 165 nations on their actual record on workers’ rights, with ratings in five categories ranging from “free” to “very repressive.” The U.S., with 37 other countries, is rated “mostly free” for workers.
But the U.S. is also sharply criticized for its weak labor laws and declining private-sector union density -- a decline the report’s lead author says is due to employer control of the union organizing process. The report also blames right-to-work laws.
The Global State Of Workers’ Rights: Free Labor In A Hostile World says 41 nations -- including Canada, Israel, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Greece, Uruguay, Chile and almost all of Western Europe -- are “free” as far as unions are concerned. The second, “mostly free” group includes some of the world’s largest economies: The U.S., Japan, India, Turkey, Brazil and Argentina, along with 32 other nations. China, now the world’s #2 economy, is rated “repressive” on worker rights.
Besides evaluating labor laws, Freedom House, which published comprehensive studies of other aspects of civil liberties worldwide over the years, used in its ratings a country’s labor law enforcement, the power -- or lack of it -- by unions to enact changes for workers politically, and national adherence to international labor standards.
It’s union political power, added Arch Puddington, the organization’s research director and the study’s lead editor, that pushed the U.S. up from the next-lower category -- “partly free” -- in a smaller, preliminary Freedom House study five years ago.
“Eight or nine countries had moved over the years,” he told Press Associates Union News Service. “Four years ago, the U.S. would have been ‘partly free,’ after some of the Bush administration policies, his appointments to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), and their decisions circumscribing who could belong to unions.
“What changed the rating was the 2006 elections, which showed the role of unions” in changing the U.S. political landscape, and their freedom to do so, he added. “They were very active politically and it made a difference.”
The U.S. could join Western Europe, Israel, Canada and the others in the totally “free” category if it passed labor law reform that took power over the outcomes of
rganizing drives out of the hands of companies and left the unions more the masters of
their own fate in organizing, Puddington said. It wouldn’t even have to be the Employee Free Choice Act -- now marooned in Congress -- but could be a more modest bill, such as the one that failed during the Carter administration, he added.
But while Puddington’s report summary calls the U.S. “mostly free” for workers and unions, its individual country write-up paints a harsher picture. Key points include:
* “The United States is almost alone among economically advanced democracies in its lack of a strong trade union movement in the private sector,” but one reason may be that “federal and state governments have built a complex network of laws, policies, and enforcement agencies designed to combat discrimination based on factors including race, gender, ethnicity, and age.” Those laws “are fortified by a series of court decisions” that let government prosecute workplace bias, the report adds.
* “Ability of workers to join unions and engage in collective bargaining has been gradually restricted through legislation, regulatory decisions, and court verdicts.” It singled out as a culprit “right to work” laws, passed in 22 states, mostly in the “more hostile” South, after the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act changed the nation’s basic labor law.
* “The laws have had a profound effect on the labor movement‘s ability to organize workers on a truly nationwide basis, restricting union growth across the South and the Sun Belt region. Meanwhile, shifts in the national economy have reduced the number of industrial jobs that traditionally supplied the bulk of union membership. This trend has been magnified through decisions by the courts and the NLRB” that “continually expanded the exempted categories” from labor law “rendering the affected workers ineligible for union protection and other benefits.
* “In addition to legal and regulatory barriers, unions confronted mounting resis-tance from employers. Management used a variety of tactics to block unionization, including intimidation of activists. At many corporations, anti-union arguments are presented to employees from the day they are hired, including at captive-audience meetings and in frequent one-on-one discussions with supervisors. Employers often resort to stalling when faced with a representation vote likely to favor the union, and have been willing to violate labor laws in their efforts to defeat unionization campaigns.
* “Workers are typically unable to obtain timely justice for acts of reprisal by management. It takes an average of two years for a worker to win reinstatement or compensation after a finding of illegal dismissal for union activity. Furthermore, when found guilty, companies are often compelled to do nothing more than provide back pay, a slap-on-the-wrist penalty that has little deterrent effect. Even when unionization has occurred, employers frequently negotiate with labor representatives in bad faith.”
(continued)
Press Associates, Inc. (PAI) -- 9/3/2010
(Freedom House, cont. -3)
And management has “taken a tougher line in recent years” with increasing use of “permanent replacements” for strikers, thus reducing the strike to being useless -- and unused -- the report says, citing federal data.
Forty-six nations were only “partly free” for workers and unions, with the top ones being Mexico, Pakistan and Russia. The “repressive” group of 26 countries included many former Soviet republics, plus China, Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan. The 14 “very repressive” nations included Burma, Laos, Vietnam, Saudi Arabia, the Sudan and Cuba.
Five years ago, Freedom House notes, China was in the “very repressive” group.
Together, the lowest two groups house one-third of the globe’s population. The “free” countries have 10% of the world’s people, while the “mostly free” nations -- including the U.S. -- have 39% and the “partly free” nations have 18%.
Freedom House also notes the remaining dictatorial countries have become more sophisticated in their repression of workers’ rights, remembering what happened in Poland starting almost 30 years ago. There, the Solidarity free union movement started a revolution that -- eventually -- toppled not just the Polish government but the whole Soviet bloc system and its government-controlled unions. The present dictators, notably in China, don’t want a repeat, it adds. And they still control their unions.
“But problems of workers are not restricted to countries with authoritarian political environments. Societies that otherwise observe a wide array of democratic freedoms… may still take steps to limit the power of trade unions as agents of collective bargaining and sources of independent political power.
“The most glaring example of this phenomenon is the United States. While the country has adopted laws that in principle guarantee the rights of workers to form unions, engage in collective bargaining, and conduct strikes and other forms of work-place protest, these rights have been circumscribed in practice over the past three decades through court decisions, political initiatives, and government policies.
“Authoritarian governments singled out institutions of civil society for special attention in recent years. Targets include democratic political parties, human rights organizations, women‘s advocates, groups that investigate corruption or monitor abuse by security services, organizations that seek legal reform, and groups that champion minority rights or religious freedom -- organizations, in other words, that aim to provide ordinary people with a voice or influence on public policy.
“The result: A noticeable setback for freedom of association on a global scale, and increased pressure on the rights of working people. The rights of workers are in jeopardy in much of the world…Given these countervailing forces, the future success of promising labor activism in countries like China is still very much in doubt,” it concludes.
