Newsletter No. 26
JANUARY 2005
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Successful international solidarity building: Gina workers in Thailand The workers of the Gina Form Bra Co, owned by Hong Kong conglomerate, Clover, show how international solidarity building can sustain the right of workers in ‘low wage’ markets to organise and bargain collectively. The 1,200 workers in this Thai factory, and their union, the Gina Relations Workers Union, overcame a vicious anti-union campaign to gain, after a two-and-a-half year struggle, reinstatement of fired union members and a collective agreement that guaranteed a decent minimum wage and basic conditions such as a limit on work hours. A research paper written for Southeast Asia Research Centre by two labour activists involved in the campaign defines a number of key factors in the workers’ success. First, the struggle entailed four key arenas: * factory, or workplace, the most critical ‘since it is the base of the pyramid’ of any campaign; * national level; * international level, particularly between national and overseas participants; * ‘global North/consumer nation’ level. These arenas need at least 5 major strategies to work: * the union & workers must be solid and cohesive, with a well developed and disciplined shop steward system so they know what is happening as fast as management and can communicate a clear, unified message. * The besieged union & its supporters must be willing to play defence — against the employer, government and ‘other opportunistic henchmen’ such as criminals and corrupt labour leaders — to give the international dimension time to develop; * Information on the ground must be authoritative and well documented, to counter misinformation from the employer (and media); * Bi-lingual, knowledgeable and on-side ‘midfielders’ must be present to effectively link the national and international sides of the campaign; The workers and union must expand their struggle to include new constituencies, building a strong coalition of international campaigners: they must reach out to pull in other unions, NGOs, consumer networks, etc to build ‘gra-saa’, or current that inexorably builds to sweep away all resistance. (See Working Paper No 75, Nov 2004 at http://www.cityu.edu.hk/searc/) |