Goodbye Proletariat!

Seymour Lipset (1990) once said that in the history of labor unions the class consciousness of workers became a determinant of a union’s action.

That is why not every union can be referred to as a labor movement. Only a union having ideological-political capacity deserves to be called a labor movement. Lipset presented this view on the basis of three types of union as follows: Business unionism, (unions with the main action of defending workers’ economic interests in the market); Guild unionism (unions that mainly defend workers’ interests against companies or corporate managers); and lastly a labor movement (unions with class consciousness against the domination of capitalism).

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Naturally, the process of formation of the three models of union takes place over a long period of time. The first and second models are characterized by the strict separation between organization and political and ideological action, whereas the third requires the integration of action with politics. This is the reason why some unions decide to set up political parties (labor parties) while other unions do not. In this way, the integration of labor movements with political parties in the world only occurs in countries with certain historical situations.

Labor parties, for instance, are accepted in British commonwealth countries, in countries with a strong social-democratic tradition and in countries with a communist ideology. Several countries trying beyond that tradition have always failed to maintain their labor parties.

External changes

At present, unions are facing external changes different from those in previous periods. This situation forces unions to make several adjustments to action models. The International Labor Organization (ILO) in the book Social Dialogue and the Future of Work (2018) identifies four

mega-drivers that will change jobs in the future: technological advancement, demographic shifts, climate change and globalization.

The change in the form of conventional jobs toward jobs without working relations (without discernible employers) makes employer-worker working relations vague so that unions find it more difficult to determine their main target of resistance.

This results from the appearance of types of work that by definition have a vague understanding. In the extreme case this condition is often called the end of employment, which is when an industrial revolution obscures the working relations between workers and employers. An example is the use of the term “partnership” or “independent contractors” in digital platform businesses. This new type of work is born out of the intelligence of capitalism that utilizes technology to undertake business more efficiently, because it can put the greater portion of labor costs on to the expense of working partners.

For example, through the partnership system as specified in Indonesia’s legislation, people who work on a platform, online, start-up basis are not regarded as wage earners, but rather are categorized as business partners. Consequently, application owners are not obligated to pay workers’ minimum wages, social security insurance (BPJS) contributions, do not provide working equipment (motorcycles, cars, computers), and need not enter negotiations of work as stipulated in the basic legislation on manpower.

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However, despite the division of unions into the three types as earlier described, the challenges faced by all unions are generally the same, which are technological changes followed by changes in manpower composition, an increasing number of workers with disguised working relations, and the strengthening of liberal labor market policy that the government has to adopt due to the pressure of global competition.

The world is gradually dominated by the digital platform business model, as a new business type that tends to keep growing to meet inevitable needs.

This is different from the situation in the post-World War II period. At that time, the main challenge for unions came from the pressure of dictatorial regimes promoting capitalist interests. Today the biggest challenge is posed by the effect of technological revolution that gives rise to massive disruption and transformation. The world is gradually dominated by the digital platform business model, as a new business type that tends to keep growing to meet inevitable needs.

In the view of Nick Srnicek (2017), the above situation prevails in the system of capitalism that remains unchanged, which always strives for new profits, new markets, new commodities and new ways of exploitation. With the rising pressure of global competition, businesspeople are constantly seeking means of winning competition by producing more efficiently, reducing production costs significantly, adopting more efficient technology, choosing investments in business-friendly rather than labor-friendly countries.

This concurs with Godard’s opinion (1997) that the escalation of flexibility of work in a country depends on three factors: market pressure, institutional structuring and the level of state intervention. It implies that flexibility of the work system will be lower in a country with a labor-friendly policy than in a country with state-sponsored flexibility of the work system.

AFP/REZAS

ndonesian workers, with one (R) wearing a shirt reading “reject omnibus law”, donate personal protective equipment (PPE) to a local hospital as part of their protest on May Day, or International Workers’ Day, in Bekasi, West Java on May 1, 2020.

What was formerly warned by the slogan “labor is not a commodity” is steadily becoming a real threat. In fact, this statement was in the past expressed by the ILO in the preamble of its establishment in 1919. The entire ILO convention was formulated to prevent competition between capital owners and competition between governments from leading to a race to the bottom.

For this reason, unions in their struggle frequently urge their governments to ratify the ILO convention as a means of overcoming the exploitation of work. It is because in practice, there are only two ways of protecting workers, which are legislation and workers’ collective struggle (to arrive at working agreements). Not by relying on the good intentions of businesses.

Toward dialogue paradigm

Industries are in stages changing to become smaller units in a fragmented geography, with a flexible work system. Parallel to this tendency, the ILO introduces a new paradigm of industrial relations, which is known as the concept of a “social dialogue”.

This concept is intended as a way of settling conflict in industrial relations by changing the paradigm of conflict in workers’ struggle toward negotiations. The social dialogue is conducted through consultations, information exchanges and negotiations.

Why is the new concept created? Two reasons are believed to be valid. First, there is a shift in the root of the problem. In the previous era, unions spent most of their time opposing dictatorial

regimes that bridled workers’ freedom of assembly. But today, even if there are still bad regimes, unions are more busily countering the operation of multinational corporations that develop a model of disguised working relations.

Likewise, technological transition will eliminate many conventional companies, with resultant mass redundancies.

Lately, a common challenge has arisen, threatening corporate and labor continuity as a result of the transition of climate and technology. As a consequence of the program for carbon emission reduction amid climate change, many emissions-contributing companies have had to close, thus triggering mass redundancies. Likewise, technological transition will eliminate many conventional companies, with resultant mass redundancies.

This external challenge forces companies and workers to cooperate in the search for a formula to tackle the climate and technological transition with justice.

This fact affirms that the map of conflict in future industrial relations will be more reflected in international dimensions than domestic issues. The process of adaptation to the transition will be more difficult to carry out in developing countries because they still face a double challenge: adaptation to the transition and the high degree of businesses’ noncompliance with workers’ basic rights.

Meanwhile, in developed countries the focus of struggle no longer concerns normative rights, but rather the program to enhance workers’ welfare. The necessity to arrange bipartite and tripartite cooperation becomes inevitable to save employment and halt the erosion of union membership. Cooperation is undertaken in three aspects: direct participation in the continuity of production of goods and services, formulation of appropriate wage levels to maintain the rate of consumption, and workers’ mobility promotion with job training.

Even in certain cases, many unions develop business enterprises and workers’ cooperatives to help members obtain cheap goods and low-interest funding. The core point is that in the future the unions are expected to play the role of partners rather than opponents.

Besides such collaboration, unions are required to build alliances with civil society groups maintaining the same values of struggle in order to strengthen the institution of democracy and the relevance of unions in the eyes of the public. Then there is the necessity to collaborate with international labor organizations to support workers’ advocacy in multinational companies.

Alliances with “non-tripartite” actors are important in the framework of increasing the legitimacy and positive image of unions in society at large.

This is because without public support, unions will earn a bad reputation among the public. The future of unions will later depend on social acceptance, instead of being merely favored by workers and the government. So, unions need to transform their role from only defending the special interests of their groups to serving as main partners in realizing economic democracy and social cohesion in society.

KOMPAS/WAWAN H PRABOWO

President Joko Widodo prepares to have lunch with workers at the PT KMK Global Sports factory, Cikupa, Tangerang, Banten, Tuesday (30/4/2019).

As a background of reflection for labor exponents, historical experience has shown that there was no period in which unions were really paralyzed, although there were times when unions got coopted and repressed. Opposition was always directly proportional to repression. Even in several cases, revolutions broke out when overwhelming pressure was imposed by the authorities.

Unions are a fundamental necessity for workers, which is inevitable in the system of economic democracy. Therefore, the historical task of unions is to ensure the realization of justice and opportunities for all workers. This task will continue to be valid in the future, as has been the case in the previous century. The difference is that there should be no more mutually negating antagonism, unless we are ready to be labeled as “accidental proletariat”.

Rekson Silaban, Analyst, Indonesia Labor Institute

(This article was translated by Aris Prawira)