A Boss is Still a Boss

NOTE: During my first few months in Gainesville, I worked at a "mom and pop" grocery store called Ward's Supermarket. Though a long-standing Gainesville institution, the bosses there are pretty tyrannical and I was happy to leave at the end of the summer. I wrote and published the below essay anonymously, during my employment at Ward's, in order to stimulate some much-needed conversation amongst area Leftists on the supposed virtues of "buying local."


In the May/June Iguana, Kevin Bond makes a good case for buying local. Research by Civic Economics—an economic analysis and strategic planning consultancy—has documented the tangible economic benefits of buying local in a variety of communities throughout the U.S. Dollars spent with locally-owned businesses tend to circulate through our economy longer than, for instance, shopping at Wal-Mart, which sends a hefty cut of each customer’s dollar to its shareholders’ pockets elsewhere. Moreover, smaller, non-chain restaurants are able to utilize more flexible menus which allow for a wider selection of in-season and locally grown food. Economic arguments aside however, as someone who has spent the better part of their life working for the “mom and pop” establishments Mr. Bond extols, I feel the need to refine his argument.

There is nothing inherent in locally-owned businesses which bestows them with “strong concerns for environmental and sustainability issues…and for issues of globalization…”, nor will these businesses necessarily “serve us socially and environmentally responsible goods and services.” I applaud those local businesses which do strive to meet these criteria, but I have also worked for plenty which exemplify the polar opposite. In many of my jobs at “mom and pop” businesses, including the one where I currently work, I have witnessed gross violations of environmental responsibility, worker safety, and basic human dignity. There are countless small business owners and managers who differ from the most truculent corporate CEO in opportunity only; given the chance, many of them would gladly take their exploitation to the global scale.

Further, since small businesses are more likely to avoid the scrutiny of large regulatory agencies or citizen watchdog groups, they frequently have less incentive to pay attention to issues such as discrimination, pollution, and workplace safety. Yet these are issues which larger companies can scarcely afford to ignore—just ask Publix, which settled a class action lawsuit for gender discrimination back in ‘97. The settlement resulted in damages of tens of millions of dollars, as well as a significant restructuring of the company’s Human Resources Department. Meanwhile, the blatant yet tolerated sexual harassment by managers at my current job continues unabated.

And finally, when it comes to the service industry, regardless of whether we’re talking about a corporate chain or a locally-owned business, very few workers are actually being paid a living wage. Many of these workers are then trapped in a cycle of poverty and forced to shop wherever they can find the lowest prices—locally-owned or otherwise. Therefore, building strong community organizations and ethics which promote environmental stewardship while amplifying the voices of working people and aggressively supporting their rights is at least as important as buying local. Otherwise we are likely to end up with nothing more than a polluted community and a local economy dominated by petty thugs and wannabe tyrants.

If locally-owned businesses have an advantage over corporate chains with regard to environmental and social justice, it’s that the people who make such decisions are our neighbors—not faceless bureaucrats in a corporate headquarters far, far away. Since we often know where they live, work, and recreate, local managers and business owners can more easily be held accountable for their actions. But this advantage only means something if we, the local consumers, capitalize on it. There are some encouraging examples that strong consumer preference partnered with business acumen can make a positive difference for our health and the environment. Witness the rise of the natural foods movement, once solely populated by low-to-the-ground independent stores who were able to respond to human needs and a growing market much quicker than the corporate behemoths; ditto for much of the green products industry. Whether customer demand can spark a similar revolution in favor of workers’ rights and a just economy, however, remains to be seen. The “fair trade” movement has some interesting prospects; but does our sense of solidarity extend throughout the entirety of the supply chain—from the peasant farmer who grows our coffee to the worker who stocks it on the shelves or the barista who brews it?

So the next time you’re patronizing your favorite locally-owned business, pondering where the item you’re about to purchase was produced, I hope you’ll consider a few additional questions:
*What is a living wage for the Gainesville area?
*Are workers in this establishment paid a living wage, treated with respect, and allowed to organize for their collective self-interest if they so choose?
*What recourse exists in our community for workers who are not being treated fairly in the workplace?

If you find that you don’t know the answers to these questions, try asking the person who’s serving you. Such conversations could go a long way in giving our community the “unique, vibrant, and sustainable” local economy that Mr. Bond, and all of us, would like to see.

Special Economic Zones in India

Special Economic Zones in India, or Hey, They Worked Great in China, Right?

This article was originally published in the October 2007 issue of the Industrial Worker, my union's newspaper.

In one of his recent works, How Much Should a Person Consume?, noted Indian historian Ramachandra Guha points out that developing nations currently on the rise, such as India and China, do not have the same opportunities for colonial plunder that were available to the West. While these budding economic superpowers are increasingly pursuing stronger "relationships" with other developing nations, to date they have relied largely on plundering their own human and natural resources in the name of development. Indeed, to quote Gandhi, "the blood of the villages is the cement with which the edifice of the cities is built."

Immediately upon arriving in India in March of this year, I found such sentiments underscored by events in the village of Nandigram in the state of West Bengal. According to official accounts, open warfare erupted between as many as 5,000 enraged villagers and paramilitary police aided by supporters of the ruling Communist Party of India. The conflict, which resulted in hundreds of injuries and the deaths of more than a dozen protestors, captivated the nation and received wide-scale media coverage. The source of the conflict: the proposed creation of a “Special Economic Zone” (SEZ) in the region and resulting eviction of agriculturalists from land that they depend upon for their livelihoods.

This outbreak of violence was but a crescendo however to ongoing struggles in the region, and throughout the country, around SEZs. Less than two months prior, the IWW’s International Solidarity Commission had issued a letter in support of a rural workers’ union (the Paschim Banga Khet Majoor Samity, or PBKMS) in West Bengal. Yet it would be naïve to allege that India’s land struggles originated with the nascent SEZ approach to development. Rather SEZs are merely the newest public face to the liberalization of the Indian economy (dating back to the early 1960s, and intensifying in the 1990s), and to the politics of rich and poor going back much, much further. As noted by the PBKMS: “The legal mechanism for these land seizures—the Land Acquisition Act—derives from [British] colonial law.” Guha also points to an “imperial model of [natural resources] management” that runs throughout modern Indian history, the aim of which has been “…to legislate commercial exploitation of [natural resources] as the only legitimate use, thereby denying traditional subsistence use by locals. Such an approach inevitably resulted in ongoing breaches of policy and even open rebellion by locals.”

A far cry from the economies of the North, in India a vast proportion of the population still relies directly on the agricultural sector for their livelihood. While academics speculate as to whether the nation’s economy has entered a “new phase” of development, a whopping 60+% of Indians still rely upon natural resource-based livelihoods, declining only 15% over the past 50 years. Agriculture directly employs 234 million Indians, and these agriculturalists, again in contrast to those in the North, run predominantly small, subsistence-based operations, with 90% of landowners still tilling their own fields. In India, as in much of the global South, land is life. Contrast this economic reality with a brutal history of land-grabs and displacement and the outcome is not hard to imagine. Indeed, India’s poor have good reason to view “development” schemes with hostility; the New Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) estimates that since 1950, 40 million people (the majority of whom are tribal people and Dalits, or “untouchables”) have been displaced from their land due to large industrialization projects; at least 75% of them still await rehabilitation and resettlement. As reported in the pages of the Industrial Worker in recent months, similar State-sponsored land grabs, also in the name of development, have resulted in mass civil uprisings in Vietnam and in China.

Though India first began experiments with free trade zones (under the rubric of “Export Processing Zones”) back in the 60s, the more recent rush to develop SEZs is frequently attributed to the “success” of this model in China. Yet as Shankar Gopalakrishnan points out in a recent re-assessment of Chinese SEZs, “The general impression that China’s special economic zones are a remarkable success is an incomplete one. Left out of the picture are inequities in development, arable land loss, real estate speculation and labour violence…What is happening in SEZs can be seen as progress, therefore, only insofar as aggregate investment is concerned; socially it is nothing but regression.” Further, he concludes that while Indian states are scrambling to emulate and even intensify the Chinese SEZ model, they have utterly failed to address the aspects of this model which have led to such regression.

Special Economic Zones in India, as in other countries, have been established with the ostensible goals of attracting greater foreign and domestic investment, improving productive capacity, and boosting employment and exports. This model typically involves a “streamlined” regulatory environment, enhanced infrastructure, tax breaks, government subsidies, and other forms of State support. And according to the Indian Ministry of Commerce and Industry, SEZs are yielding great results, with an increase of hundreds of thousands of new jobs and several billion dollars of private investment predicted by year’s end. Yet these rosy statistics leave many questions unanswered and gloss over a few important facts on the ground.

Already mentioned is the highly contentious issue of displacement of those dependent upon natural resources, such as the Mundra SEZ in Gujarat, whose development undermines the livelihoods of local fisher-folk and pastoralists, or the proposed Midnapur petrochemical SEZs in West Bengal, which would be built alongside and over top of the area’s freshwater supply and farmlands. In addition to dispossessing locals and the specter of environmental spillover, SEZs are also specifically designed to create “industrial townships” or “countries within a country,” thereby removing authority from local governments and even township residents and relaxing important labor, health and safety, and environmental legislation. If SEZs are truly being established to advance the common good, then they should obviously be beholden to citizens and to laws enacted to protect residents and the natural environment. In the words of one local NGO critical of the SEZ model, “…this is a new form of the East India Company establishment.”

Indeed, the SEZ debate epitomizes the competing interests of rich and poor so frequently glossed over in “development” schemes. By simply designating their project a SEZ, developers are able to (sometimes forcibly) acquire land at rock-bottom prices, fueling a highly-speculative real estate boom with powerful ripple effects for neighboring farmers struggling to hold on to their land as well as landless agricultural laborers. While the robber barons make a fortune, those most ill-prepared to adapt to the rapid economic, demographic, and ecological shifts accompanying the SEZ model of development are left behind. Further, since no more than 50% of the overall land area of the SEZ is required to be devoted to manufacturing, the rest can be used for “support infrastructure” such as housing developments, shopping malls, and other amenities aimed at India’s growing middle class—all subsidized at taxpayer expense. As with China’s SEZ experience, rapid development in a few privileged pockets will likely be exchanged for revenue shortfalls in the country’s poorest districts—a policy which can only exacerbate regional inequalities.

Critics of SEZ policies can be found even within the ranks of the Indian bureaucracy, with the Finance Ministry bemoaning an estimated 1,750 billion rupees (>$43 billion) in foregone tax revenues by 2011—a hefty price tag for a cash-strapped government unable to deliver basic services to much of its populace. To-date it has not even been adequately demonstrated that the private sector investment flowing into the SEZs is a direct result of the policy itself, as opposed to capital which would have been invested in the fast-growing Indian economy anyway but is simply being redirected towards the path of least resistance (as capital is wont to do). Sunita Narain of CSE points to Korean giant Posco's mega steel plant as a case in point: “It 'managed' to get categorized as an SEZ, well after it had already come into the country to set up shop.”

Given the high social costs and inequitably-distributed benefits of current models of development, citizens’ groups across India are agitating for alternatives. Sadly, scenes such as those witnessed at Nandigram are likely to reoccur. Today there are few regions of India which are not caught up in one way or another with contentious land disputes that pit the State and moneyed interests against the working poor, many of whom with little left to lose. In response to this public outcry, the government has taken a number of steps, including limiting the size of SEZs and stripping state governments of the power to acquire land on behalf of developers. The Ministry of Rural Development is also formulating a much-needed overhaul to the State’s approach to resettlement and rehabilitation, and political leaders have suggested that productive farmland should not be diverted to SEZ projects. Whether these reforms will address criticisms of SEZs without also undermining the professed goals of the program remains to be seen, but for the moment at least, the SEZ march continues largely unabated. As of this summer, a total of 339 SEZs had been formally approved by the central government, with another 170 projected approvals on the way.

WORKS CITED:

-Guha, How Much Should a Person Consume?

- Guha chapter in Environmental Issues in India for commentary on how British colonialist policy/relations w/ rurals has continued under independent India (e.g., 1935 declaration re: State’s role in land acquisition)

-ISC solidarity letter re: West Bengal: http://lists.iww.org/private/isc/2007-January/000881.html

-IUF statement on violence/repression in West Bengal: http://www.iuf.org/cgi-bin/dbman/db.cgi?db=default&uid=default&ID=4017&view_records=1&ww=1&en=1

-“India: General strike called after 14 protesters killed” http://libcom.org/news/india-general-strike-called-after-14-protesters-killed-20032007

-“Special Economic Zones: Are They Good for the Country?” by Ram Krishna Ranjan, Centre for Civil Society

-Shri Kamal Nath, India’s Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, addresses University of Oxford (University College) re: the Doha round of the WTO negotiations. May 4, 2007. http://commerce.nic.in/pressrelease/pressrelease_detail.asp?id=2025

- March 2005, IMF Country Report No. 05/87. “India: Selected Issues”

-Economic and Political Weekly May 26, 2007 “Nandigram and the Question of Development” MALINI BHATTACHARYA

- Economic and Political Weekly May 26, 2007 “Help the Rich, Hurt the Poor: Case of Special Economic Zones” E A S SARMA

-Shankar GOPALAKRISHNAN, “Negative Aspects of Special Economic Zones in China” Economic and Political Weekly April 28, 2007.

-CSE’s Natural Resources Management and Livelihoods “Towards Green Villages” workshop materials

-Website, Indian Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Department of Commerce: http://sezindia.nic.in/HTMLS/about.htm

-“Prowling tiger: India pushes anew for special economic zones”

Jul 9th 2007, From the Economist Intelligence Unit ViewsWire: http://www.economist.com/agenda/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9462984

-“A peasant surprise: A scheme to provide land for industrial development hits the skids”

Jan 25th 2007 | GAR CHAKRABERIA, From The Economist print edition: http://www.economist.com/background/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8597150

-“Cash cows: They worked in China. But will India's zones boost investment, or just divert it?”

Oct 12th 2006 | DELHI, From The Economist print edition: http://www.economist.com/world/asia/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8031219

-Editorial Note: SEZ Policy “Ceiling on size will limit growth” by Savita Kulkarni

-website and research paper of Paryavaran Mitra http://paryavaranmitra.org.in/

-“A concession called SEZ, all for foreign exchange: Special Economic Zones barter away democracy” by MAHESH PANDYA AND HIRAL MEHTA; http://downtoearth.org.in/Full6.asp?FolderName=20061031&FileNAme=news&sid=30&sec_id=18

- Sunita Narain editorial in Down to Earth 10/25/06

-Gobar Times, 30/6/07 http://www.gobartimes.org

-Asian Development Bank, Asian Development Outlook 2007

-Down to Earth, “Freeze on special economic zones lifted” 4/30/07: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20070430&filename=news&sec_id=4&sid=12

-“Background Paper: Land Acquisition and Displacement” Shri. Sanjay Upadhyay, Supreme Court Advocate, New Delhi

-“Land Sovereignty and Food Sovereignty the Key Issue in the Land Debate,” Dr. Vandana Shiva

-“Testimonies from Nandigram,” April 15, 2007, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20070415&filename=news&sec_id=4&sid=1

-“Mundra SEZ Spells Displacement for Fisherfolk” March 31, 2007, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20070331&filename=news&sec_id=50&sid=18

-“UP Farmers Continue Protest Over Land Acquisition by Reliance” February 15, 2007, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20070215&filename=news&sec_id=4&sid=6

-“Update” Dec. 31, 2006, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/Full6.asp?FolderName=20061231&FileNAme=news&sid=60&sec_id=4

-“SEZ, How Special” November 15, 2006, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/cover.asp?foldername=20061115&filename=news&sid=58&page=1&sec_id=9&p=1

-“Scratched record: Will SEZs succeed, where precursors failed?” November 15, 2006, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20061115&filename=news&sec_id=9&sid=59

-“Zones of conflict: Land acquisition has united farmers” November 15, 2006, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20061115&filename=news&sec_id=9&sid=61

-“Not wasted: New compromise excuse to grab” November 15, 2006, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20061115&filename=news&sec_id=9&sid=63

-“Windfall loss:Tax breaks: Public money for private gain” November 15, 2006, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20061115&filename=news&sec_id=9&sid=64

-“New nabobs” November 15, 2006, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20061115&filename=news&sid=66&page=2&sec_id=9

-“SEZs get a social face” Down to Earth, Oct. 31, 2006: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20061031&filename=news&sec_id=4&sid=8

-“Union ministries clash over SEZ” September 30, 2006, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20060930&filename=news&sec_id=4&sid=8

-“Gujarat NGOs demand separate environment court” July 15, 2006 Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20060715&filename=news&sec_id=49&sid=51

-“SEZ who?: No industrial revolution this“ March 15, 2006, Down to Earth: http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20060315&filename=news&sec_id=4&sid=17

-“Protests against land acquisitions in India intensify“ 8/22/07, http://southasia.oneworld.net/article/view/152479/1/

-“Medha Patkar criticises Indian govt's new SEZ policy” April 9, 2007, http://southasia.oneworld.net/article/view/148030/1/

-“Nandigram bloodbath puts WB’s land acquisition policy on hold” March 20, 2007 http://southasia.oneworld.net/article/view/147295/1/

-“India:Special Economic Zones on the Backburner” Feb. 12, 2007, http://southasia.oneworld.net/article/view/146035/1/

-“Indian economic zones 'hitting the poor'” http://uk.oneworld.net/article/view/145038/1/ 1/21/2007

-“Modhwadia smells foul play in land allotment to DLF” September 6, 2007 http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=254904

-Shoma Chaudhury interview with Arundhati Roy, March 31, 2007, http://www.tehelka.com/story_main28.asp?filename=Ne310307Its_outright_CS.asp

Bangladesh: National Garment Workers Federation

Abbreviated report from June 2007 Dhaka meeting between the Bangladeshi National Garment Workers' Federation and a representative of the IWW’s International Solidarity Commission

This article was originally published in the August 2007 issue of the Industrial Worker, my union's newspaper.

Many readers of the Industrial Worker are already acquainted with the ongoing struggles in Bangladesh’s garment sector, as well as the activities of one of its most vocal unions, the National Garment Workers Federation (NGWF). Over the past three years numerous Wobblies have worked to build solidarity with the NGWF, most notably in Pittsburgh and upstate New York. At a “Labor Notes” conference in May 2006, Fellow Worker Greg Giorgio met with the NGWF’s General Secretary, Amirul Haque Amin. When asked how the IWW’s International Solidarity Commission (ISC) could best be of help to the NGWF’s struggles, FW Amin replied: “We need continuous support. But before providing support, we need more (time to learn) about each other. So, I will be happy if someone from the IWW visits Bangladesh...the NGWF...our members, share their struggles, share their information.”

In early June of this year, I was able to accept Amin’s invitation and visit the NGWF office in Dhaka on behalf of the ISC. Our meeting took place barely one year after “a wave of fierce class struggle” brought Bangladeshi garment workers (and others) into direct clashes with police and the military. This months-long conflict resulted in several workers killed, thousands more injured or imprisoned, and over a dozen factories burned to the ground. The current atmosphere, though tranquil by comparison, was nevertheless foreboding; early monsoonal rains had already flooded out some parts of Dhaka, and a government-imposed “State of Emergency” remained in effect, with general elections postponed indefinitely and a resulting backslide in labor rights and civil liberties.

It was heartening however to learn that despite government restrictions on public protest, the NGWF’s union-building activities continue apace, including membership recruitment, worker education and organizer trainings, and provision of legal assistance. NGWF membership now stands at >22,000 workers, 5000 of whom are classified as “regular subscribers” (i.e., members who regularly pay union dues of 10 Takas/month), with the remainder classified as “subscribers.” Currently the NGWF has 30 factory-based unions, and 1000 “factory committees” (a factory committee is a first step towards forming a union in the workplace).

Amin views these membership numbers as a real victory given the extreme difficulties with forming unions in Bangladesh. When the NGWF was founded 23 years ago, they had no office space and organized their meetings in parks, cheap restaurants, academic institutions, and other public spaces. Now the union has grown to 7 offices, including 6 branch offices covering all the industrial zones plus their central office in Dhaka. The NGWF also now has 11 full-time organizers and 8 part-time. Yet despite the union’s growth, Amin still refers to the NGWF as “small and not well-funded compared to the trade union organizations elsewhere.”

Another striking feature of the NGWF, and of the Bangladeshi garment sector, is its gender composition: 80-85% of Bangladeshi garment workers are reportedly women. The NGWF tries to reflect this demographic reality in its organizational structure and according to the NGWF’s constitution, at least 50% of any committee must be comprised of women. The union’s National Council, its highest decision-making body, currently has 16 women (out of 30 members), including a female President, both Vice Presidents, the Treasurer, and other officers. Of their 19 staff, 11 are women. The NGWF’s gender composition has also influenced its campaigning, and one of the union’s primary campaigns has been for the implementation of maternity leave.

Other NGWF campaigns in recent years have included:

• *campaign for the implementation of free trade union rights (respective to International Labor Organization conventions 87 & 98--the right to organize and collective bargaining)
  
• *campaign for a six-day work week
• *campaign for improved health, safety, and security
• *campaign for a paid May Day holiday
• *campaign for an annual (Muslim) festival bonus

Throughout the sector, forcing bosses to simply follow Bangladesh’s existing labor laws has been a major ongoing struggle, and a much more difficult one while the State of Emergency is used to repress workers’ direct action.

Apart from gathering more in-depth information on how the union operates, another major purpose of our meeting was to discuss continued collaboration between the IWW and the NGWF. Amin reiterated in no uncertain terms that pressure from consumers onto multi-national corporations, and from these corporations onto their sub-contractors, is extremely important. Unions such as the NGWF will continue their fights at the local level, but they are limited in what they can accomplish without the solidarity of people outside the country. Basically, there are millions of unemployed Bangladeshis, and the bosses can fire with impunity, knowing that they can easily replace however many workers they need to. What is much more difficult is for the individual factories to continue to receive orders once their reputation has been damaged publicly. As such, according to Amin, international pressure on the brand-companies is as important, and some times even more important, than anything the workers can do locally. Amin insists that the NGWF and their allies in the West have to build capacity and partnership, acknowledging that a key aspect of that partnership is information exchange linking conditions in specific factories with particular brands/corporations. From their end, the NGWF would like to commit two additional staff-people specifically to such a focus, and Amin estimates that the total cost for the organizers would be $200/month. Realizing such a proposal obviously requires more detailed discussion.

Also on the topic of information exchange, Amin agreed with FWers in Pittsburgh that the formation of not only North-South, but also South-South communication networks is crucial. As such, he thinks that the possibility of the IWW facilitating exchanges between the NGWF and workers’ organizations in Latin America is a “very interesting and useful concept.” He requests that the IWW play a central role in such a project, making the initial introductions between the NGWF and groups in Latin America, from which point the three groupings (NGWF, IWW, and Latin American unions) could have ongoing conversations.

Amin is also very interested in the idea of organizing along the entirety of the supply chain. He supports projects which would, for instance, connect U.S. workers in Wal-Mart’s distribution centers with Bangladeshi garment workers sewing the clothes with Latin American workers producing the fabric. Amin believes that such an approach is essential if workers are going to win in the long-run and suggested Wal-Mart as an appropriate target, stating that “all workers throughout the world” need to be targeting the company—due both to the sheer size of their supply chain as well as the symbolic value of all that the company represents.

And finally, we discussed more immediate and concrete means of increasing the levels of communication between the two unions. The NGWF would like to begin receiving a few additional copies/month of the IW to share with their branch offices, and agreed to submit more regular updates to IW regarding their activities. Amin is also interested in having a few key IWW materials translated into Bengali and perhaps doing a sizable print run of these materials to distribute to NGWF members.

Overall, our meeting was both comradely and productive. While no major breakthroughs were accomplished, some small steps were made, and a relationship that could with time become very important for both unions was strengthened. I will be based in India until at least the end of 2007, possibly longer, and if the ISC requests another trip to Dhaka during that time I will gladly oblige. In the meantime, the ISC, as well as Fellow Workers who support this budding IWW-NGWF relationship, have much to discuss and follow up on.

During the period of writing and researching this article Jason Fults was a Thomas J. Watson fellow based in New Delhi, India. To obtain a complete copy of his 4500-word “Bangladesh Report,” more photos, or an audio recording of the meeting, reply to this post.

Solidarity across Borders

Solidarity across Borders: Western and Chinese Workers

This article was originally published in the April 2007 issue of the Industrial Worker, my union's newspaper.

"Our factory was bought up by a capitalist. They got everything and paid next to nothing for it. They said that government policy allows it. They got the lot! They promised capital infusions, higher wages, new products, new projects - but none materialized. The police protected the capitalists! But the capitalists are the ones with all the power…workers only have their fists…hundreds of migrants were hired at 50 yuan a day to beat up the workers."
-anonymous Chinese worker

As most Western workers are keenly aware, China has experienced tremendous economic growth in recent decades, averaging more than 9% annually for nearly the past 30 years. We see the effects of that growth on our own shores in the form of an ever-widening trade imbalance (the U.S.-China trade deficit rose to $202 billion in 2005), a steady loss of manufacturing jobs, and the ubiquitous "Made in China" labels on the consumer products we buy. But what has this rapid growth meant for Chinese workers?

Since the late 1970s, China has been restructuring its economy more towards a model of privatizing state-owned enterprises, opening up to foreign capital, and dismantling the welfare state; what has been referred to as "neoliberalism with Chinese characteristics." This restructuring has led to unprecedented economic opportunity for some, but has been accompanied by deterioration of job security and basic economic rights, staggering income inequality, and dangerous levels of pollution. In addition, Chinese factories have become synonymous with sweatshops, and independent investigations have routinely uncovered 90+ hour work-weeks, abusive management, below-subsistence wages, wage arrears, and exposure to occupational diseases such as silicosis experienced by Chinese jewelry workers. Under this new model, factory owners can rely upon lax enforcement of existing labor laws at the local level, and have done their part to undermine worker solidarity and evade closer scrutiny. Commonly-cited company tactics include hiring workers through employment agencies, pitting workers from different regions or ethnic groups against one another, targeting potential militants, fines and illegally withholding wages, and false record-keeping.

Under conditions such as these, one would hope that workers, especially workers long-inculcated with a Marxist analysis of capitalism, might have recourse in the form of a fighting union. Unfortunately, such is not the case. Not only is China’s sole union, the All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU), largely viewed as ineffectual and pro-management, most private sector workers are not even represented. Perhaps most egregiously, neither independent labor organizing nor the right to strike has been protected under Chinese law and has in fact been brutally repressed. A few Hong Kong-based pro-labor NGOs have maintained online listings of dozens of Chinese activists who are currently incarcerated (some for twenty years to life) for organizing outside the confines of the ACFTU.

It appears that many Chinese workers are caught in an ever-tightening vise grip between unsympathetic and repressive elements within their own government, a weak and unrepresentative workers’ organization, and the forces of international economics. In particular, two groups of Chinese workers have borne the brunt of this assault perhaps more fully than most: migrant laborers (disproportionately young women) and workers who have retired or been laid off from formerly State-Run Enterprises (SREs). As foreign investment has flooded China's manufacturing sector and privately-owned workplaces have replaced the socialist danwei, or work unit model of production, up to 200 million rural Chinese have migrated to the cities in search of employment and a better way of life. Many of these workers haven't been provided with legally-required labor contracts by their bosses and aren't officially registered in their new residences; hence they have been more susceptible to abuse and less able to effect recourse or access public services.

Meanwhile, nearly 40 million former SRE workers had been laid off by 2001, often leaving them with only a meager and temporary unemployment compensation package. The dismantling of the danwei system and its impact on these workers cannot be understated, as the former SREs were an essential staple of the pre-reform economy. They provided workers with not only secure employment and a meaningful, well-respected role in Chinese society, but also basic amenities such as housing and health care. In both instances the ACFTU's frequent silence on issues of worker wellbeing while instead "educating" workers to support the government's reforms has highlighted where the union’s true accountability lies.

With few other options open to them, these groups have resorted to the same strategy as beleaguered workers elsewhere: direct action, and at a startling rate. According to official government statistics, 3.76 million Chinese took part in 74,000 "mass incidents of unrest" in 2004, rising to 87,000 "incidents" in 2005. That’s 200+ demonstrations per day, and a six-fold increase over the number recorded in 1993. The motivations behind such protests vary widely, including environmental injustices and local government corruption, but many of them are in direct response to employer abuses and other economic concerns.

One factory in Dongguan, which had been criticized by China Labor Watch since at least 2001, was recently "victim" to this worker outrage. Tired of forced-overtime and below-subsistence wages, these workers decided that their livelihood was more important than the Happy Meal toys they were producing and took to the streets. In the open conflict that followed, more than 1,000 workers clashed with security personnel and destroyed company property until riot police regained control of the factory. A separate incident in a Xianyang textile factory in 2004 involved as many as 7,000 former SRE workers. These workers took pre-emptive action when a new majority shareholder of their factory proposed changes that would affect wages, seniority rights, and working conditions. After their initial efforts to form a worker-run branch of the ACFTU were rejected by union officials they waged a six-week, 24-hour a day picket line. This action brought them into direct conflict with local authorities who attempted to forcibly break the strike and arrest its leadership.

Such large-scale and highly-charged direct actions present an apparent paradox with the notion of an authoritarian society. Yet it has been observed that some Chinese authorities exhibit significant "class consciousness" in their responses to worker unrest. For instance, protests by retired and unemployed workers are treated more delicately than those which actually threaten to halt production. In addition, authorities seem much more willing to tolerate unrest when it involves only one factory or industrial sector, but respond with brutal efficiency if these actions begin to draw wider support from the public or other sectors.

Still, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has genuine cause for concern. The CCP’s legitimacy as a tightly-controlled, monopolistic ruling party that supposedly represents workers’ interests stems largely from its ability to deliver the goods in the form of an increasing standard of living for the citizenry. At the same time that it is facing growing, dangerous levels of unrest, the CCP is also in a weaker position in terms of its control over the economy--thanks largely to the very reform policies it has adopted in the name of economic growth. To address these concerns, the government has sought to upgrade its existing labor laws and to strengthen the role of the ACFTU in the nation’s workplaces. Recent developments on these fronts are instructive.

In a move last summer that took many by surprise, Wal-Mart’s China division announced that it would facilitate the establishment of ACFTU branches at each of its 60 stores, covering around 30,000 "associates." Why would a company that is internationally-recognized for its labor rights violations and aggressive union-busting voluntarily unionize all of its stores? One of China’s many under-enforced labor laws states that if even a single employee expresses an interest in being a member of the union, then a branch must be set up in that workplace. In what some consider an opening bid to unionize all foreign-owned companies, the government apparently decided that the time was right to begin enforcing this law. Despite long-standing attempts to resist unionization, Wal-Mart didn’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind was blowing and likely recognized that it would be much more prudent to make nice with ACFTU officials early on. Notably, the changes apply only to Wal-Mart’s retail employees and not the Chinese manufacturing companies that make up 80% of Wal-Mart’s suppliers.

In another much-publicized development, China’s National People’s Congress has in recent months drafted new legislation which will affect important issues such as the ACFTU’s collective bargaining rights, control over factory rules, and job security, among others. Further, the draft legislation could raise the stakes significantly for companies that continue to violate the country’s labor laws. This aspect of the legislation will be key, and underlies long-standing difficulties in enforcing central government policies—especially those related to labor and environment—that may be perceived as inhibiting economic growth. As an old Chinese idiom notes, "Tian gao, huangdi yuan," or "heaven is high and the emperor is far away."

Apparently the bosses, thoroughly dismayed at these reform efforts, have been exercising a bit of direct action themselves as of late. As an academic and organizer of a recent conference to discuss the proposed legislative changes recounted:
"We should keep alert on the intention to destroy the labor law. During the conference, some people want to replace labor law with corporate social responsibility and criticize labor law with [Human Resource Management] theory. What’s more, someone from [American Chamber of Commerce Shanghai office] led more than 20 human resource managers of US enterprises to crash into our conference room, threatening us that they would withdraw capital if we would not revise the draft according to their demands. I was angry about that…" While an official from the Chamber office later denied that these "protesters" were actually Chamber agents, there is no denying that both the American and European Chambers have been actively trying to shape the government’s reforms to suit their own interests. Sadly, the ACFTU has not waged a grassroots campaign to counter their influence.

With regards to both the new labor law and the unionization drive, the CCP is working to either appease the angry masses or to at least channel their frustrations into State-controlled institutions, thereby reasserting its role in managing the economy while also maintaining social order. Noticeably however, an approach the government has not tried is to allow Chinese workers significantly greater latitude to take matters into their own hands. This model of governance fits into an overall pattern characterized as "consultative Leninism" by China scholar Richard Baum: "By substituting paternalistic consultation for autonomous political participation, cooptation for representation, advice for empowerment, and consensus-building for the clash of conflicting interests, the CCP has arguably been able to avoid much of the putative clutter and chaos of democratic pluralism."

There are differing opinions amongst labor scholars as to whether the barriers to a true workers’ movement in China are insurmountable, at least for the immediate future. Clearly though, workers need and deserve a greater degree of political freedom in order to collectively advance their interests, and either reclaim or perhaps even replace existing structures that have failed them. It is shameful though sadly unsurprising that there has not been greater pressure from the West for China to "open up" to more than just foreign capital flows. Yet this strategic inaction reminds us that workers in both industrialized nations and elsewhere must strengthen and unify our struggles against the bosses, who are working ever harder to realize their own economic vision not only at home, but abroad. As noted in a recent issue of Asian Labour Update, "…there is virtually no voice on this issue from any international trade union expressing solidarity with the Chinese workers in fighting for better labour rights by denouncing or condemning the foreign business bodies publicly." So we must speak out where others cannot in order to advance both our interests.

At the same time, it is important to recognize that the Chinese government is not a monolithic whole and that there are factions which are speaking out ever more loudly on behalf of workers from within the system. Some observers express optimism that these advocates, coupled with the reforms underway, will in fact better the situation of Chinese workers. Anita Chan, a labor scholar at the Australian National University, suggests that the ACFTU is struggling to redefine its role within an economy and society that is dramatically different from the one in which it was created. She warns that any strategy which further isolates the ACFTU will only undermine genuine efforts to improve the livelihood of Chinese workers and that international unions should instead work with the ACFTU to help build its capacity.

Yet perhaps our most efficacious avenue for building solidarity with Chinese workers lies in forming relationships with the NGOs and independent workers’ organizations who are striving to advance workers’ rights. Many of the more "radical" of these organizations have apparently found it conducive to locate their offices in Hong Kong; due to the "one country, two systems" approach that the CCP agreed to upon reclaiming Hong Kong from the U.K., there is significantly greater freedom of expression there. Most of these organizations also have operations on the mainland and monitor developments there quite closely, produce regular and informative publications, and even organize campaigns against particular corporations or on behalf of workers in specific industries. These organizations not only need our expressions of solidarity and participation in their campaigns, due to the severe lack of an NGO-infrastructure they also need more direct support.

China is without a doubt a nation on the rise, and what happens within its borders will have profound implications for the entire planet for generations to come. Rising labor, land, and energy costs coupled with the government’s emphasis on becoming an "innovation society" may indicate that China’s days as the maker of Happy Meal toys are numbered. The government continues to make significant investments in education and scientific/technological development, and increasingly it is not just bottom-of-the-barrel manufacturing firms that are seeking to set up shop on the mainland. China was one of the only developing nations to participate in the Human Genome Project, for instance, and is also making sizable allocations towards research in the cutting-edge field of nanotechnology.

Whether all of these developments taken together will in fact help to raise China’s standard of living while building a "harmonious" society remains to be seen. While no one can predict exactly what the outcome will be, a growing number of academics, politicians, and bosses are watching the numbers and hedging their bets. People who hold genuine concern for our planet and its inhabitants have no such luxury, however. For us, the path is clear, and we must heed the simple yet sage advice of Gandhi, "The future depends on what we do in the present."


Works cited:
*"China Drafts Law to Empower Unions and End Labor Abuse" October 13, 2006,
By DAVID BARBOZA (NYT); Business/Financial Desk
*Adam Greene, NYT Letter to the Editor, 10/13/06
*"No Labor Shift Seen at Wal-Mart" By Abigail Goldman and Don Lee; The Los Angeles Times; 11 August 2006
*"Government pledges to get serious about labour rights" in China Development Brief ‘01
*" Wal-Mart Wins Ruling on Foreign Labor" NYT 12-19-06
*NYT August 26, 2006 "Rising Production Costs Join the List of What China Exports"
*" Official Union in China Says All Wal-Marts Are Organized" By DAVID LAGUE; NYT 10/13/06
*"Chinese Workers Protest at Factory Making Toys for McDonald's" NYT July 28, 2006
*"BUSH REJECTS CHINA INQUIRY" NYT BUSINESS BRIEFS July 22, 2006
*"A.F.L.-C.I.O. Files a Trade Complaint Against China's Labor Practices" NYT June 9, 2006
*"Hotel Worker's Murder at Work Leads to Thousands-Strong Protest Signaling Deep Discontent with Widespread Corruption and Impunity in China" from http://asianfoodworker.net/china/070125dazhu.htm 1-25-07
*website of Institute of Contemporary Observation
*"A SHARP DEBATE ERUPTS IN CHINA OVER IDEOLOGIES" NYT March 12, 2006
*"CHINESE WOMEN WORKERS ORGANIZE IN THE EXPORT ZONE" in New Labor Forum, Spring 2006; Jenny Wai-ling Chan
*"Is there a labour movement in China?" John Chen, June ’06 issue of "Asian Labour Update"
*"A new class war is brewing in China" June ’06 issue of "Asian Labour Update" Apo Leong
*"Causes, Implementation, and Consequences of Xiagang" June ’06 issue of "Asian Labour Update" Apo Leong and John Chen
*The Worldwatch Institute’s "State of the World 2006"
*"A Second Attempt at Looking for Mickey Mouse’s Conscience: A Survey of the Working Conditions of Disney’s Supplier Factories in China." 12/06 report by Students and Scholars Against Corporate Misbehavior.
*"Falling Through the Floor: Migrant Women Workers’ Quest for Decent Work in Dongguan, China" September 2006 by the China Labour Bulletin
*"Hivac Startech Film Window (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd., An Investigative Report on Labor Conditions." 8/23/06 report by Students and Scholars Against Corporate Misbehavior
*Woodrow Wilson Center, Asia Program Special Report, June 2006, "China and Democracy: A Contradiction in Terms?"
*Woodrow Wilson Center, Asia Program Special Report, September 2004, "ACTIVE SOCIETY IN FORMATION: ENVIRONMENTALISM, LABOR, AND UNDERWORLD IN CHINA"
* COMPETITION & CHANGE, Vol. 9, No. 2, June 2005 181–200. "Globalization and Paradoxes of Ethical Transnational Production: Code of Conduct in a Chinese Workplace" by NGAI-LING SUM1 and PUN NGAI