What defines a union?

  1. bricolage
    bricolage
    I understand the critical position taken towards trade unions however I have heard some groups that claim to be trade unions described as political groups or something similar. There are also examples of organisations that share the same anti-union position proposing workplace organisation under a different name. What I am trying to get at here (and I think I once asked this on the main forum but got no answer) is what defines a trade union as opposed to something else entirely. I would imagine it is to do with the role is plays in society but how does this come about, is it through legal recognition? is it through entering into negotiation? Is it something completely different?

    Many thanks.
  2. Alf
    Alf
    I think the key aspects is that the organisation is permanent and that it actually has the ability to 'represent' the workforce or part of it. Many of the syndicalist groups which claim to be unions simply lack the means to do this (which is usually a good thing for their survival as proletarian groups), while those who do take on this role - like the SAC in Sweden end up playing the same negative role as the rest of the unions. Don't know if that helps.
  3. bricolage
    bricolage
    By representation do you mean in terms of negotiation? Surely though any kind of workplace organisation, even if is not a union (such as the Platform of Struggling Workers the ICC supports in Turkey) makes claims to some sort of representation?
  4. Alf
    Alf
    There is a difference between a group which recognises that it is a minority (like the platform in Turkey) and agitates for workers' self-organisation on a wider scale, and a minority which already claims to express the interests of whole workplaces or sectors. A key element here is that unions present themselves as 'experts' in organising the struggle or carrying out negotiations
  5. bricolage
    bricolage
    When you speak of it as a minority though does that not imply if the union were a majority the criticism would no longer stand?
    I'm interested in this as it is quite easy to see how existing unions work in the favour of co-opting struggle and are alien to revolutionary praxis but it is harder to explain how it is inevitable any union will end up like this.
  6. zimmerwald1915
    When you speak of it as a minority though does that not imply if the union were a majority the criticism would no longer stand?
    I'm interested in this as it is quite easy to see how existing unions work in the favour of co-opting struggle and are alien to revolutionary praxis but it is harder to explain how it is inevitable any union will end up like this.
    Not really. The distinction is between a group that is working toward clarity for the benefit of the working class in its struggles and a group that claims or seizes the representation of the working class in its struggles.
  7. Lyev
    Lyev
    Don't wanna hijack a thread here, but I have some questions myself regarding the left-communist position trade unions. I cannot seem to find the exact post, but I remember Devrim posted a while ago that, contrary to Trotsky's belief, the communist left does not believe that trade unions can be transformed into "organs of struggle" (or something to that effect) under capitalism. There was a recent (and I think still ongoing) debate between the CPGB and the ICC in the Weekly Worker. Here is a passage summing up the ICC's position on trade unions (emphasis mine):
    In contrast to the syndicalist unions, the Arbetier-Unionen were willing to affiliate with the Communist movement. The provisional statutes drawn up by the Bremen federation included solidarity with the Communist International. Contrast this fighting orientation with the spineless cosying up to the Prussian junker state by the yellow unions, which resulted in the union bureaucracy putting increasing pressure on the leaders of the SPD to engage in subversive politics, and manifested itself in the SPD's attempt to put a cap on mass political strikes for suffrage reform in Germany which occurred just before the war. Contrast it also with the political activity of modern trade-unions, which usually goes as far as tailing behind various single-issue campaigns, and the general lack of fighting spirit which caused the outlet Reuters to remark that “the most remarkable thing in this age of austerity is just how few strikes there have been and how weak and ineffective unions have proved... the crisis has laid bare a truth partially hidden during the boom years: Europe's unions are less powerful, less influential, and less relevant than they have been for decades.” Contrast it with May 68 in France where the unions put the cap on the strike, with the Italian Hot Autumn where workers drove the union representatives from strike meetings, with Solidarnosc in Poland which diffused the workers' committees and mass meetings and made deals with the Stalinist state apparatus, and with the pamphlets coming out in France in the wake of the current struggle criticising the union leadership for leading them to defeat.

    The old trade-unions represent on the economic field what the labour and social-democratic parties represent in the political field. They represent the working-class within capitalist society and as members of that society. Although their early orientation may have been a fighting one, they have increasingly been drawn into the apparatus of the capitalist state. The Arbeiter-Unionen represents the working-class as a class with a historic interest in seizing power and dissolving their own status as proletarians, and in turn the whole of class society.
    How on earth - if it is largely true that trade unions are in fact arms of capital used to derail proletarian struggle, to soften militancy etc. - can communists organise and agitate amongst workers? I understand some groups of the communist left advocate activism within union's rank-and-file. I think the Arbeiter-Unionen obviously needs to contextualised within the post-WWI period of mass working class struggle, with similar movements as the ones in Germany & the Netherlands, appearing in about 20 other countries: it seems as though that period, due to the economic destruction wreaked by the war, was the closest that capitalism has come to being globally overthrown.

    Anyway, I suppose this is all linked to the left-com position of decadence, right? How is it that trade unions have gone from being yesterday's "organs of the proletariat" to today's "instruments of capital"? Why is it that the working class "cannot maintain permanent organisations for the defence of its economic interests"?

    I think it is a very difficult undertaking to try and persuade the millions of workers active in unions to suddenly stop using them as a tools to defend their interests. Sorry for all the questions, but I have one final query; are there many concrete and clear examples from recent industrial disputes that solidfy the left-communist claim that trade unions are "instruments of capital"? Many thanks comrades
  8. Zanthorus
    Zanthorus
    There was a recent (and I think still ongoing) debate between the CPGB and the ICC in the Weekly Worker.
    That debate wasn't between the CPGB and the ICC. It was between the CPGB and me. The ICC was nice enough to post my article on their site. For some reason the CPGB thought I was an ICC member and put this in the paper. They realised their mistake and changed the online edition but the paper copies had already been printed. This may be where the confusion comes from.

    That analysis of trade unions is actually half the ICC's analysis and half the analysis of the user 'Die Neue Zeit', from who I got the reuters quote (See: Sociopolitical Syndicalism as Additional Partiinost).

    How on earth - if it is largely true that trade unions are in fact arms of capital used to derail proletarian struggle, to soften militancy etc. - can communists organise and agitate amongst workers?
    The ICT has a policy of setting up 'factory groups', nuclei of workers with anti-capitalist politics struggling outside the unions. The Italian section, Battaglia Comunista, has managed to set up two of these in Italy, one in Fiat and one in the Titan works in Bologna. They are not particularly large from what I gathered, but they are a way of organising within the class without becoming members of the union apparatus.

    I think even without the above it would not be overly difficult to agitate amongst workers during periods of struggle. I know the ICC has been involved in the events in France recently. When struggles radicalise and the workers move outside of the trade-unions then it would be those for winning back the unions who were left in the lurch.

    I think it is a very difficult undertaking to try and persuade the millions of workers active in unions to suddenly stop using them as a tools to defend their interests.
    What millions of workers active in unions? The percentage of unionised workers' in Britain is somewhere in the mid 20's.
  9. Lyev
    Lyev
    Thanks for the reply
    That debate wasn't between the CPGB and the ICC. It was between the CPGB and me. The ICC was nice enough to post my article on their site. For some reason the CPGB thought I was an ICC member and put this in the paper. They realised their mistake and changed the online edition but the paper copies had already been printed. This may be where the confusion comes from.

    That analysis of trade unions is actually half the ICC's analysis and half the analysis of the user 'Die Neue Zeit', from who I got the reuters quote (See: Sociopolitical Syndicalism as Additional Partiinost).
    In that case, thank you! It was very informative article. I bought a paper copy, and thought it was the ICC.

    The ICT has a policy of setting up 'factory groups', nuclei of workers with anti-capitalist politics struggling outside the unions. The Italian section, Battaglia Comunista, has managed to set up two of these in Italy, one in Fiat and one in the Titan works in Bologna. They are not particularly large from what I gathered, but they are a way of organising within the class without becoming members of the union apparatus.

    I think even without the above it would not be overly difficult to agitate amongst workers during periods of struggle. I know the ICC has been involved in the events in France recently. When struggles radicalise and the workers move outside of the trade-unions then it would be those for winning back the unions who were left in the lurch.
    But how easy is it, really? What ground has been made from them (actually could you direct me to an article from the ICT or some other group defending them, or showing where they have been recently successful)? I think I'm closer to the ICC position here - if I am correct, they advocate agitating amongst union rank-and-file. The average worker who is part of union has different interests to those in the bureaucracy, but I think this leads onto the next point...

    What millions of workers active in unions? The percentage of unionised workers' in Britain is somewhere in the mid 20's.
    I think either we misunderstand each other, or our definition of "being active" is quite different. The unionized workforce in the UK is roughly 7 million. This goes back to my previous point; it just doesn't seem to make sense to deliberately make a special effort to organise outside of unions, or at least in the current economic and political climate. As you say, when "struggles radicalise" then workers do often act independently of their unions, but until those moments come, it seems for me to pragmatic to at least work within them on a grassroots level.
  10. bricolage
    bricolage
    Re: The ICT 'factory groups'. I think this is what I was trying to get, ie. what in practical terms differentiates the form of such a group and the way it acts from a trade union?
  11. Zanthorus
    Zanthorus
    But how easy is it, really? What ground has been made from them (actually could you direct me to an article from the ICT or some other group defending them, or showing where they have been recently successful)? I think I'm closer to the ICC position here - if I am correct, they advocate agitating amongst union rank-and-file.
    No, the ICC's position is that the trade-unions are not a field of activity for revolutionaries at all. The ICT are also the ones who defend working in the union rank and file, although they defend this as agitation for workers managing their own struggles outside the unions.

    I think either we misunderstand each other, or our definition of "being active" is quite different. The unionized workforce in the UK is roughly 7 million.
    Yes, but this figure is still by far a minority of the class. I think it is wrong to suggest that we are running up against some insurmountable wall here trying to convince workers' that the trade-unions derail struggles.

    This goes back to my previous point; it just doesn't seem to make sense to deliberately make a special effort to organise outside of unions, or at least in the current economic and political climate.
    What about the current economic and political climate makes organising outside of the unions not make sense? In all situations the primary task of the Communist movement is the organisation of the class as a class for itself, something which is not being helped by the existing union apparatus.

    Re: The ICT 'factory groups'. I think this is what I was trying to get, ie. what in practical terms differentiates the form of such a group and the way it acts from a trade union?
    They have a revolutionary political programme.
  12. bricolage
    bricolage
    They have a revolutionary political programme.
    Well then you could argue the IWW is not a union (depending on how you conceive the IWWs 'programme'), you could argue that existing unions can be reclaimed if a revolutionary political programme could be instituted in them. A programme doesn't address the social role that the unions and/or factory groups play.
  13. Devrim
    Devrim
    Don't wanna hijack a thread here,
    Don't worry. You aren't.

    How on earth - if it is largely true that trade unions are in fact arms of capital used to derail proletarian struggle, to soften militancy etc. - can communists organise and agitate amongst workers?
    Why do you see activity within the union as the only way to 'agitate and organise' amongst workers?

    I understand some groups of the communist left advocate activism within union's rank-and-file.
    If you mean activity amongst unionised workers all left communist groups advocate it. If you mean by trying to reform the unions none of them do.

    think the Arbeiter-Unionen obviously needs to contextualised within the post-WWI period of mass working class struggle, with similar movements as the ones in Germany & the Netherlands, appearing in about 20 other countries:
    I think that the term 'Arbeiter-Unionen' is misleading as it implies a form of union. Actually though the German word for union is 'Gewerkschaftsbund'. The Arbeiter-Unionen were not unions but political organisations based upon the dictatorship of the proletariat.

    think it is a very difficult undertaking to try and persuade the millions of workers active in unions to suddenly stop using them as a tools to defend their interests.
    Yet in any big struggle workers find themselves having to fight against their unions, and actually find that they can't use the unions to their advantage.

    but I have one final query; are there many concrete and clear examples from recent industrial disputes that solidfy the left-communist claim that trade unions are "instruments of capital"?
    I think every strike I have been involved in. The is a recent article from the ICC press in Turkey written by a TEKEL worker during their dispute:

    "If the unions are on our side, why are there 15,000 riot police between us and them?"

    March 2nd, despite all our objections, the tents were taken down by the union bosses and the street in front of the Turk-Is HQ was cleared with us being told we had to return home. 70 to 80 of us stayed in Ankara in order to discuss what we could do for the next three days. After these three days, 60 of us returned to our hometowns, and 20 of us including myself stayed for two more days, so although the Ankara struggle lasted for 78 days, we stayed for 83. We agreed that we had to work very hard in order to advance the struggle, and I too eventually returned to Adiyaman. As soon as I got back from Ankara, 40 of us went to visit our class brothers and sisters involved in the Cemen Tekstil strike in Gaziantep. The Tekel struggle was an example to the class. I was, as a Tekel worker, both proud and also thought that I thought we could do more for our class and that I had to contribute to our class. Although my economic situation did not allow it and despite the exhaustion of 83 days of struggle and other problems, I had to do more than I could to move the process further. What we had to do was to form a formal committee and take the process into our own hands. Even if we couldn't formalize it, we at least had to form it by keeping in contact with workers from all cities, since we were to return to Ankara on April 1st.

    We have to go to everywhere we can and tell people about the Tekel struggle to its last detail. For this we have to form a committee and unite with the class. Our job is harder than it seems! We have deal with capital on the one hand, the government on the other and the trade-union bosses on the other hand. We all have to struggle in the best way. Even if our economical situation isn't good, even if we are physically tired, if we want victory, we have struggle, struggle, struggle!!!

    Although I was away from my family for 83 days, I stayed at home only for a week. I went to Istanbul to tell people about the Tekel resistance without even having a chance to catch up with my wife and children. We had many meetings of the informal Tekel workers committee especially in Diyarbakir, Izmir, Hatay, and I participated in many meetings with fellow workers from the informal committee in Istanbul. We had meetings in the Mimar Sinan University, one in Sirinevler Teachers' Hostel, one in the Engineers' Union's building, we had discussions with pilots and other aircraft workers from the dissident Rainbow movement in Hava-Is [a trade union], and we met with law employees. We also met with the Istanbul chairman of the Peace and Democracy Party and asked for Tekel workers to be given the chance to speak on the Newroz holiday. The meetings were all very warm. Our request from the PDP was accepted and they asked me to participate in the Newroz demonstrations as a speaker. Because I had to return to Adiyaman, I suggested a fellow worker from Istanbul as a speaker. While I was in Istanbul, I visited the struggling firemen, Sinter metal workers, Esenyurt municipality workers, Sabah newspaper and ATV television strikers on the last day the struggling workers from the Istanbul Water and Sewers Department (ISKI). For half a day, we talked with these workers how we can make the struggle grow bigger and also we told them about the Tekel struggle and discussed. What the ISKI workers told me first was that they started their struggle with the courage they got from the Tekel workers. Every demonstration I went to, every struggle I visited, this I heard, ‘We got courage from Tekel', in the week I spent in Istanbul, this made me feel the happiest. The time I spent in Istanbul was very fulfilling for me also. There were also bad things, of course, unfortunately a close relative of mine passed away but I still decided not to leave and stay the whole week as planned.

    Speaking of bad things, in this period, 24 student class brothers and sisters were kicked out of their school (Mehmetcik High School) for supporting the Tekel struggle. Also, in Ankara, a class sister of ours from the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK), Aynur Camalan, was fired. When capital is attacking us workers like this, so ruthlessly, we have to unite against it. Thus we made two press announcements in Adiyaman and showed that our friends were not alone. We also had been preparing for the demonstration on April 1st. What the trade-union bosses wanted was to go to Ankara with 50 people from every city, with a total of one thousand. As the informal committee, we increased this number from 50 to 180 in Adiyaman alone, and I myself came to Ankara with ten other workers on March 31st. Despite all the announcements of the union to make the number limited to 50, we managed to help 180 workers come (with us covering the costs, not the union), because we were aware of how the trade-union wanted to manipulate like they did before. We had meetings with lots of mass organizations, associations and unions. We visited Aynur Camalan, the TUBITAK worker sister, who had lost her job.

    On April 1st, we gathered in Kizilay [the centre of Ankara, the capital of Turkey] but we had to make a lot of effort to get to the street in front of Turk-Is, because 15 thousand policemen guarded the building. What were all these policemen doing in front of us and the trade-union? Now, we have to ask those who stand against us even when we talk about the union bosses, even when we say the unions should be questioned: if there is a 15 thousand-strong police barricade in front of us and the trade-union, why do the trade-unions exist? If you ask me, it is quite natural for the police to protect the union and the union bosses, because don't the union and the trade-unionists protect the government and capital? Don't the trade-unions exist only in order to keep the workers under control on behalf of capital?

    On April 1st, despite everything, 35-40 of us managed to cross the barricade one by one and went to the street in front of Turk-Is. Our purpose was to have a certain majority and to manage for other friends of ours to get there, but we failed, unfortunately our majority couldn't deal with 15,000 policemen. The trade-union had declared previous that only 1000 of us would come to Ankara. As the informal committee, we managed to increase this number to 2300. 15,000 policemen were blocking the way of 2300 people. We gathered on Sakarya street. We were to at least spend the night there, with all those who came to support us. Within the day, we had been attacked twice by the police with pepper gas and police batons. Our purpose was of course to spend the night on the street in front of the Turk-Is HQ but when we came up against the police, we stayed in the Sakarya street, but during the night the trade-unionists silently and cunningly called for fellow workers to leave the area. We remained only as a certain minority. The trade-unionists called myself too several times and told me to leave the area but we did not heed to the call of the union bosses and stayed as a certain minority. When the supporters also left around 23:00, we had to leave as well.

    There was to be a press announcement on April 2nd. When we were about to enter Sakarya street at about 9:00 in the morning, we were attacked by the police, who again used pepper gas and batons. An hour or so later, about a hundred of us managed to cross the barricade and had a sit-in. The police kept threatening us. We kept resisting. The police finally had to open the barricade and we managed to unite with the other group who had remained outside. We started marching towards Turk-Is but the union bosses did what they had to again, and made their press announcement 100 meter away from the Turk-Is HQ. No matter how we insisted, the union bosses resisted to going to the street in front of Turk-Is. The union and the police joining their hands, and some among us actually falling for what they stood for, we ended up not managing to go to where we wanted to go. There was an interesting point among the things the trade-unionists had said. They said we will come back on June 3rd and stay in front of Turk-Is for three nights. It is curious how we will manage to stay there for 3 nights, as we didn't even stay for a single night this time. Afterwards, the police had to first protect the trade-unionists from us and aid their escape, then we were left alone with the police. Regardless of the threats and the pressures of the police, we did not disperse and then we were once again attacked with pepper spray and batons and had to disperse. In the afternoon, we had a black wreath made by some flourists in order to condemn Turk-Is and the government, which we left in front of the Turk-Is building.

    My dear class brothers and sisters, what we have to question is, if there are 15 thousand policemen barricaded in front of the trade-union and the worekrs, why do the trade-unions exist. I am calling on all my class brothers and sisters, that if we want victory we have to struggle together. We the Tekel workers have lit a spark, and we shall turn it into a massive fireball all together. In this sense, when I express my respect for all of you, I want to conclude my text with a poem:

    The steam of the tea flies away while our lives are still fresh
    Cloths get as long as roads, and only sorrow returns
    A bown of rice, they say our food has landed on our homes
    Yearnings become roads, roads, where does labour go
    Hunger is for us, cold is for us, poverty is for us
    They have called in fate, living with it is for us
    Us who feed, us who hunger, us who are naked again
    We have not written this fate, it is us who will break it yet again
    We the Tekel workers say that even if our head hits the ground, still we shall leave an honorable future for our children.

    A Tekel Worker from Adiyaman
    Devrim
  14. Devrim
    Devrim
    But how easy is it, really? What ground has been made from them (actually could you direct me to an article from the ICT or some other group defending them, or showing where they have been recently successful)?
    Re: The ICT 'factory groups'. I think this is what I was trying to get, ie. what in practical terms differentiates the form of such a group and the way it acts from a trade union?
    I have asked them to come and answer your questions.

    Devrim
  15. Devrim
    Devrim
    Well then you could argue the IWW is not a union (depending on how you conceive the IWWs 'programme'), you could argue that existing unions can be reclaimed if a revolutionary political programme could be instituted in them. A programme doesn't address the social role that the unions and/or factory groups play.
    I think that the role is important rather than a formal programme.

    Devrim
  16. Jock
    Jock
    [FONT=Verdana]In response to the requests for more on the GIFT (internationalist territorial and factory groups) I have stuck in the draft statement which by chance I just translated (it will be part of the internationalist version of "Socialism or Barbarism" a basic statement of the politics of the ICT. Its in green because it is not finalised and reading it I can see it will need polishing. It probably doesn't do more than raise questions but its a start... Thanks to Zanthorus for his accurate comments on our position on working in unions etc. As you will see we regard these groups as not just a one way street (and they do not preclude participation in other forms of more ephemeral, spontaneous or whatever groupings that emanate from the working class.[/FONT]


    [FONT=Verdana]The party itself organises the so-called “internationalist factory and territorial groups” in order to intervene in the struggle of the working class. The political bodies of the party are forced to promote economic struggle – seeking continually to point the working class towards a greater level of consciousness and a more decisive conflict with capital – and to attract the most active and conscious workers in the inevitable period of reflux of the struggle, in order to give continuity to the communist programme and organisation by enriching it with the contemporary living experience of the class struggle. Not all the workers who belong to the factory group are party members but they share its basic outlook, including its anti-capitalism and the rejection of any union forms.[/FONT]

    [FONT=Verdana]The emphasis on territorial groups implies the formation of bodies, committees, communist circles, from whatever workplace or sector which take account of the changed situation compared with the past where the workers were mainly concentrated in big workplaces from which came the most significant struggles[/FONT][FONT=Verdana] The dispersal of the working class into smaller units of production and the even great geographical dispersal of the working class favours on one side, and imposes on the other, the coming together of the class vanguard on a territorial level. This is also because it is highly likely that the most significant future struggles, outside and against the union gaol, will begin from the territorial regroupment of the class vanguard.[/FONT]

    [FONT=Verdana]The communist factory and territorial groups are moreover characterised in pushing for proletarian solidarity and the unification of struggles on an international level, for unity with immigrant workers everywhere against the exploitation and unemployment which dominates the global labour market.[/FONT]