Labour, Class and Economy: Rethinking the Trade Union Struggle

It is by now a commonplace argument that the trade union movement in general and the Indian trade union movement in particular is, at best, under strain and, at worst, in a state of crisis (Thomas, 1995; Tulpule, 1996; Munck, 2002; Hariss, 2003). The following conversation between Luis Anderson (a leading Latin American trade unionist of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions) and Bruno Trentin (a leading Italian trade unionist) that was recorded in the mid-1990s by Munck points directly to the heart of the problem: The objective of representing informal work in our countries implies a true cultural revolution and, yes, it would be a bit like going back and confronting situations, conditions and strategies similar to those the trade union movement confronted when it was born. We need to broaden the base of representativity, widen it to include new categories or workers, to include and offer representation to those not enrolled. This would reinforce the representativity and democratic nature of the union. We speak of a cultural revolution, because it means changing completely the horizon of trade union strategy and to change, at the same time, the forms of representation which the trade union had adopted for a whole century (Anderson and Trentin in Munck, 2002: p. 127).