Italy
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Thoughts for a new trade unionism
Proposals of the radical new SLAI COBAS union. Extracts from Dai COBAS al sindicato, by Gigi Malabarba (reviewed on page 35)
• The world of work has sexual characteristics. Any analysis, any demands must recognise this basic fact. Feminism should be integrated into all aspects of union work. We should abandon the logic of lists of programmatic points which, somewhere, dutifully mention "the women question" • The same point about our method can be applied to other questions. Notably ecology. The contradiction between people and nature can and should be more and more frequently linked to the fundamental contradiction: between capital and labour. We should approach ecology from an anti-capitalist perspective. Any approach which neglects the relations of production can only lead to the adoption of "green" neoliberal ideologies, like those of the trade union confederations today... • The globalisation of the economy challenges any approach which tries to defend national interests. Nowadays that would mean defending the interests of the companies against the interests of those who work there... We should not adopt protectionist measures, particularly now that frontiers are no longer decisive: the crucial decisions are more and more frequently made by the IMF and the World Bank. A class struggle trade union should demand, in each country and at the international level, equality of conditions in the sale of labour power. This means not simply campaigning for solidarity with the most over-exploited sectors of humanity, but creating conditions for defending the interests of the proletariat of the metropolis itself. Otherwise, the "free circulation of goods" , free of all constraints on the conditions of production, will break even the most determined worker resistance. • While we should be wary of Toyotastyle company unionism, we should not under-estimate the importance of the immediate workplace and its problems. This is where problems emerge, and where class struggle trade unionism can surge up... We should pay more attention to "guerrilla" campaigns for specific demands. These may seem reductionist and economistic, but they are essential for building a consensus and organising ourselves, by exploiting all the room for manoeuvre and contradictions at the various levels of contract, legislation and practice. The enterprise is still the heart of worker's monitoring and control experiences. New technology does not make the demand for workers' control out of date. Far from it. It makes it possible to imaging workers' control at a much wider scale, from intervention in the way work is organised to control over production itself. • Resistance, and the winning of guarantees for the workers can only effectively be managed at a more general, inter-professional level. Such global action must include the basic defence: protection of salary. This includes both direct wages and indirect benefits and delayed salary (pensions). • It is difficult to build a welfare state though the intervention of a public sector discredited by theft, wastage and bureaucracy. We now face a generalised privatisation campaign, and, while we should not give up our defence of the public sector and social security, we should think about re-launching the mutualist-type experiences of the workers' movement at the beginning of this century, in areas like health, training, housing and so on. We should, of course, prioritise self-organisation and self-management, without setting a goal of making profits. • The recomposition of a combative social bloc necessitates the reformulation of a social and political programme of transformation and alternative, a transitional programme based on "rupture goals" which can bring us all together, and which each of us should strive to realise. *
International Viewpoint nª274 5
* Italy