Union Workers Research Articles

Exploring the performance of casual workers of banks in Sokoto-Nigeria

Despite the unpleasant conditions, such as lower and insufficient wages, higher working hours, longer length of service, total absence of casual workers union, indirect employment aided by the bank’s top directors, etc., casual workers are highly committed in performing their roles and achieving their organizational goals. Neoliberal theory and Equity theory were used for guidance in this study. The study employed qualitative analysis style; Total of ten banks were selected as a sample of the study involving sixty participants who were all casual workers; twenty-four female and the remaining thirty-six were male, have been selected using purposeful sampling. Content analysis was used as the method of data analysis. The study shows some of the functions performed by the casual workers of Nigerian banks include quick client service, amenability to work, client care services, opening of accounts, marketing, and timely task completion. Others include furnishing prompt client service, being prepared to work, and finishing assignments on schedule., thus, the study concludes that despite the outstanding performance of casual workers in achieving their organizational pretensions, they’re largely exploited. The recommendation of the study is that employment should be grounded on fair stipend, safety at work and protection for casual workers, in short, work should encompass fairness, equivalency, and freedom of association. Also, Payment of the benefit accumulated by the casual workers should be linked directly between casual workers and their associations.

Pengembangan Kompetensi Pemasaran Digital bagi Wirausaha Kelompok Buruh Migran dan Keluarganya

The Indonesian Migrant Workers Union (SBMI) is an organization that represents the interests of Indonesian migrant workers. SBMI aims to advocate for the rights of migrant workers in Indonesia, protect them from exploitation, and improve their working conditions and welfare. Through the learning and development of accounting systems, promotion management, digital marketing, and innovative product development for digital-based economic groups, the Indonesian Migrant Workers Union (SBMI) is expected to provide a good opportunity to enhance personal and family economics. The Community Service Team (PkM) from Fisipol UKI collaborated with lecturers from Pasundan University to initiate the socialization and training for migrant worker unions in Sukabumi, West Java. The PkM team focused on training participants in utilizing E-Commerce applications and the Tik-Tok social media application to market their products. Participants also engaged in direct practice of marketing products on E-Commerce and Tik-Tok applications. After undergoing direct training, participants then completed a post-test, showing significant progress with 97% of participants understanding the concept of marketing using E-Commerce and Tik-Tok. At the conclusion of the socialization and training, the UKI PkM Team provided social media accounts and phone numbers to participants for easier communication when they have questions or need assistance with product marketing.

Climate change and energy transition: Perceptions of emergency, responsibility, and the future imaginaries of Manitoban unionized workers

This paper explores the perceptions and future imaginaries of a group of union members in Manitoba, Canada, concerning climate change, energy transition, and the roles of unions and workers in climate politics. Based on interviews with 30 rank and file workers carried out through the winter of 2020, the results suggest some starting points for a more active engagement between the labour movement and climate politics—an engagement that is central to climate justice, and that becomes more vital every moment as workers both participate through their waged labour in the production of ecological crisis, and stand to suffer intensely from both climate change and from elite-led energy transitions.

Struggling for the right to struggle: Cultural workers’ labour rights and unions

This paper explores how writers in the South Korean broadcasting industry have collectively struggled against their precarious working conditions and faced distinctive difficulties in taking their collective actions, including unionization. Based on semi-structured, in-depth interviews with 23 research participants, this paper examines why and how these South Korean writers have established various forms of collective worker organization: from a professional association to informal grassroots communities, to a women-only trade union, to two unions of media workers who are freelance or on contract. I argue that the activism of these writers reflects the intersection of different identities, ranging from women to freelancers to cultural workers and that their activism promotes the idea that working creatively, autonomously and equitably should be recognized as a basic labour right.

Working apart: Domestic outsourcing in Europe

Lower-skilled workers face increasing pressures. Their bargaining position is declining under the twin pressures of globalisation and technological change; and they risk losing access to better positions as firms’ pay and conditions arrangements increasingly drift apart. Rising between-firm differences partly come about through increasing separation of lower-skilled workers into lower-paying firms with worse conditions, thereby reducing their opportunities further. Such polarisation is partly driven by (domestic) outsourcing where main firms take certain tasks that are seen as non-core out of their payroll, instead purchasing those same tasks from another official employer or temporary employment agency while retaining control. Outsourcing generally brings worse conditions and lower pay. This paper uses cross-national European data from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) along with contextual data to study how outsourcing – proxied by moves to business services providers or temporary employment agencies – contributes to a worse labour market position of lower-educated workers over time. I find that (1) domestic outsourcing is increasing over time across Europe; (2) outsourced workers are working under generally worse conditions than their counterparts; and (3) this process is not universal: it hits harder in sectors with greater technological innovation and can be alleviated by union density and worker representation.

In the Shadow of the State

The National Union of Road Transport workers (NURTW) is the main transport organization in Nigeria and has replaced local governments in most garages of the country. The NURTW exercises its authority in Lagos garages through its own set of rules, qualified here as garage laws. They aim at providing revenues for the union, for state institutions, for police bodies and at ordering motor parks and disciplining drivers. Based on observations and 80 interviews with unionists, the article looks at the ways these laws are implemented by unionists and agberos or local touts turned into union workers. Some rules depend on the authority of union chairmen but most of them are routinized and powerful mainly because they are co-produced by the union and state institutions. Understanding garage laws helps to move beyond visions reducing transport unions as mafia organizations and states in Africa as weak institutions unable to implement state laws.

Protection of labor rights of medical workers by trade unions in the Republic of Kazakhstan

The article covers the practical activities of a number of Kazakhstani sectoral trade unions of healthcare workers to protect the social and labor rights of medical workers. Once the activities of these trade unions were studies, the authors drew attention that in recent years they are guided by international standards, conclude contracts for implementation of various projects with the International Labor Organization, which not only determines ways to build the potential of trade unions and stimulate social dialogue in the field of health, but also shows shortcomings in the activities of trade unions and offers effective measures to prevent them in the future. At the initiative of the trade unions of the industry, now Kazakhstan intends to ratify a number of ILO conventions with essential value for healthcare development. Some attention is paid to the activities of trade unions during COVID–19 pandemic, in particular to the protection of medical workers serving patients with covid infection and who did not receive the lump-sum payments for this. The article includes positive experience of trade unions that developed "Memo on legal protection of healthcare workers, organized the activities of the group of lawyers "Medical Lawyer", "Salary calculator". It analyzed individual and collective complaints received by the trade union, mainly concerning non-reflection of provisions of the Sectoral Agreement for 2020-2022 in the collective agreements of medical institutions regarding the establishment of increased official salaries, increased surcharges for certain categories of medical workers. It is noted that in the whole country, there is unserious attitude of employers not only to the drafting of the content of collective agreements, but also to the conclusion, extension of their validity, additions and changes due to various socio-economic factors, changes in labor legislation.

The Right Fight: The Culinary Union vs the Elardi Family in Las Vegas, 1991-1998

Abstract: Organized Labor commands a major role in the operations of Las Vegas's hotel and casino industry. The current dominant position of the Culinary Union that includes hotel workers as well as casino employees in the large gaming properties arose from bitter struggles between the industry and labor dating back to the 1970s, and the murder of union leader Elmer "Al" Bramlet. The strike against the Elardi family's Frontier Casino at the outset of the 1990s brings into focus the challenges of union organization in a Right-to-Work state such as Nevada and the national anti-labor policies initiated by Ronald Reagan's presidency in the 1980s. Wages, conditions of work, scope of work, healthcare, equal pay for equal work (status of male and female workers), the right to strike, and the worker's right to be rehired by an employer also became hard-fought causes in the struggle for union contracts and worker representation by a union. The strike against the Frontier Casino and other Elardi properties became a key point of controversy in the Culinary Union's battle to represent the interests of workers across the broad spectrum of Las Vegas's hotel-casinos from the smallest casinos to the largest resort-hotel-casinos with their many amenities of entertainment, fine dining, recreational facilities, and in some cases art galleries.

Union Struggles and Working Time in Australia: Past, Present, and Future

Union Struggles and Working Time in Australia: Past, Present, and Future

Risk factors identified from the company-union relationship: Evidence from the Mexican Stock Exchange

Purpose: To analyze the risk factors in the relationship between unions and companies listed in the Mexican Stock Exchange Price and Quotations Index. Methodology: The study employed a qualitative, cross-sectional, descriptive approach, utilizing content analysis techniques. Information contained in the Annual Reports of 20 companies listed in the Mexican Price and Quotation was examined.Results: Industrial sector companies have a higher number of unionized workers. However, some companies in the identified sectors do not report the percentage of workers who belong a union. Among the risk factors reported regarding the company-union relationship, strikes and legislative changes stand out. Implications: The companies under study have implemented risk management programs that not only help them identify risks in their relationships with unions but also document them in their annual reports, setting an example for other organizations to follow. Such practices both mitigate undesirable events and create opportunities for growth. Our results contribute to the knowledge of Enterprise Risk Management (ERM), including its phases, definitions, and a comprehensive inventory of risks associated with company-union relationships. This knowledge serves as a catalyst for the adoption of ERM practices across the Latin American region.Originality: This study highlights risk identification as a tool for crucial decision-making regarding company/Union relationship. The study is the one the first addressing risks by ERM between company and unions.

Exploration and Application of Intelligent Service Mode of College Labor Union under the Spirit of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee

Abstract Under the guidance of the spirit of the Third Plenary Session of the Twentieth Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), colleges and universities have set off a boom in the construction of modernized information service systems. This paper relies on the importance and feasibility of the development of the intelligent service platform of the labor union in colleges and universities and preliminarily constructs an intelligent service platform that can meet the needs of the management of labor union work in colleges and universities. The platform adopts B/S architecture, uses the MVC pattern as a platform design plug-in, and uses the J2EE platform as the main technical platform for the development of the college union management information system. Through the information collaboration network to the union information modeling, with the help of the system’s SQL language function, through the ODBC database-driven service linking method, to ensure the safe and stable operation of the university trade union intelligent service platform. The test results show that under the IO-intensive load verification, the platform memory utilization rate is stable between 56.30~71.05%, the tuning strategy can be applied to the actual college union management scenario application, and the validity and versatility of the parameter tuning scheme have been verified. At the same time, the test results of platform information collaboration association strength show that the maximum information entropy of each associated node is 19.08, and the results can provide a basis for the construction of the information collaboration network of the university smart labor union.

Russian population’s political activities in the first third of the XX century on the example of the Peasant Union creation movement

The article studies peasantry’s political activities development in Russia in the first third of the XX century. The reasons and the essence of the Peasant Union in the revolutionary events of 1905–1907 and 1917, the Civil War and in the period of the new economic policy have been revealed. The periods of peasantry’s political activities, conditioned by the state policy transformation in village, have been distinguished. Starting from 1905, the authorities tried to involve peasantry in the political agenda. However, politicization could not be controlled in the conditions of the revolution. Peasantry’s political activities were used by the opposition forces, the SRs and Bolsheviks, who proposed a program understandable to the peasant social psychology. The Third Monarchy suspended the Peasant Union activities. In February 1917, the Union work continued under the control of the SRs. In August 1917, Peasant Congress adopted the SR program documents. Calls to create a union during the Civil War took place against the background of peasants’ disillusionment with the “war communism” policy. In 1921, the idea of creating the Peasant Union was revived. Contradictory nature of Bolshevik policy, the concept of “interlocking” between city and countryside, growing “emergency” and crises of the new economic policy against the background of granting peasants relative economic freedom led to peasant demands growth for protecting their economic rights and creating organizations that resembled trade unions in city. These demands were not institutionalized. The movement reached all strata of village. The surge of demands of the United State Political Department dates from 1927–1928. It is conditioned by the transition to collectivization. It has been concluded that, despite the lack of the Peasant Union concept, diversity of demands, different understanding of association in rural society, movement for its creation testified to increased socio-political activity of the population. When the state policy outlined the rollback of the new economic policy principles, the number of votes in favor of the Union increased. The growth of socio-political tension in villages was evident. The Party began to pursue a policy of social division in villages to prevent radicalization of sentiments.

Light at the End of the Tunnel: Mining Justice and Health

The mining industry provides valuable mined commodities and financial support for communities worldwide. Mining has become safer for workers. Significant injustices, however, are created by mining companies for workers, local communities and the environment. Mining workers are amongst the world’s most vulnerable because of the dangerous nature of their work, inherent health risks, and problematic, neo-colonial ways in which the industry is governed. Given the scope of these problems, solutions are often challenging, yet this article proposes various responses to global mining inequities. In this article, examples of safe and adequately compensated programs to improve workers’ rights, environmental impacts, and social conditions related to mining will be discussed. Here, solutions to some problems caused by mining are examined, with a focus on workers’ health and human rights through unions and cooperatives, targeted programs for improving mental well-being, the feminization of the mining workforce; the possibility of reducing demand for mining products through reuse and reducing consumption. Ameriolating mining governance is key, through enhanced implementation of human rights, safety, and labor standards, specifically applying the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) to mining issues; mining justice organizations play a vital role, particularly in accountability and publicity of mining issues. Canada is spotlighted here as it houses approximately 75% of mining company headquarters, primarily due to favorable tax and investment conditions and the concentration of skilled labor. Greater unionization and cooperativization of mining workers hold great promise for improving health and safety conditions of miners. Feminizing the mining workforce promises to improve both productivity and profits. While mental health is often ignored, Australia’s Mates in Mining program has improved mental well-being and reduced depression and suicide amongst mining workers. Expansion of such programs worldwide would positively impact workers, their families, and improve productivity. Moreover, third-party certification for mining workers’ rights, such as Fairmined, ought to be expanded while universal human rights declarations ought to be upheld. Social justice movements improve worker’s rights, environmental impact and social conditions related to mining. In this article, the importance of improving larger socioeconomic and political conditions in which mining workers operate are also examined, such as reducing demand for mined commodities and recycling more effectively. Improving Indigenous land-based rights is another crucial aspect of creating more just mining practices. Mining offers many workers, particularly those in Canada and other high-income nations, a decent income and benefits. Equivalent wages and benefits ought to be paid to all mining workers worldwide. “It is possible to move from tunnel vision-profit-oriented mining practices which damage workers, communities and environment, to light at the end of the tunnel-- healthy workers, communities and environment”.

Trade unions in Germany: challenges and solutions

German trade unions traditionally play critical role in securing fair work conditions and wages. However, in the XXI century they are facing significant challenges, caused by effects of globalization, structural changes in the labor market and others. The most prominent problem is gradually declining membership and therefore shrinking resource capacity. Necessity to attract new members encourages them to undertake many different actions: from increasing protest activity to altering their work models. Author considers the cases of German trade unions and how they react to the acute issues and their connection to the protests. Author draws a conclusion that structural transformations of the labor market have been more impactful than changes in their public perception. Worker unions have remained a significant and influential force in political and social fields. Nevertheless, format of their work requires significant modifications to strengthen them as organizations that truly represent workers interests.

دور النقابات العمالية في حماية حق العمل بالقطاع النفطي

The trade union right is one of the most important social and civil rights that the most constitutions seek to guarantee. Trade and professional unions have played a key role in protecting workers' rights by defending the rights and interests of workers who belonging to them, and trade unions have played an important role in providing a link between public authorities or administration on the one hand, and workers on the other, and trade unions' public position has been strengthened through its objectives that sought to achieve in promoting adequate guarantees for workers to exercise and enjoy their rights. It is not secret that oil unions have played an important role in protecting oil workers by attempting to communicate workers' voices in petroleum license round contracts and obtaining their rights from foreign companies working for them, as well as the oil and gas workers who work in the private sector. However, a lack of organization and coordination among them in efforts to protect oil workers has resulted in a clear weakness and fragmentation in the work of trade unions, and thus led to loss.

Work-related diseases and risk factors associated with work-related musculoskeletal disorders among unionized metal industry workers: a cross-sectional study

Objectives. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of work-related diseases (WRDs) and work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WR-MSDs), as well as investigate WR-MSD-associated risk factors, among metal industry workers in Turkey. Methods. The cross-sectional study was conducted with 1374 members of the Birleşik Metal İş Union from 121 companies. Data were collected using a self-administered 30-item questionnaire. Results. The survey response rate was 81.4% (1374/1686). Almost one out of every six workers (14.8%) stated that they had been diagnosed with a WRD, 3.6% reported that they had been diagnosed with an occupational disease and 38.6% of them indicated that they had suffered an occupational accident (OA) at least once. The prevalence of WR-MSDs was 10.7%, of work-related lung diseases was 1.8% and of occupational hearing loss was 0.6%. Quitting smoking, smoking, OA, heavy lifting, time pressure and working in the automotive industry were all associated with WR-MSDs. Conclusions. Interventions aimed at reducing musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) should focus on smoking cessation, training workers in proper techniques and equipment for lifting and pushing/pulling heavy loads, preventing OAs and injuries, and reducing the time pressure in the workplace in the metal industry.

‘The natural leader of the proletariat’: Eduard Bernstein on trade unions and the path to socialist cooperation

ABSTRACT This paper offers a reinterpretation of Eduard Bernstein’s theory of evolutionary socialism. It does so by examining the leading role that he envisioned for unions of skilled workers in the socialist movement. During his time in London in the 1890s, Bernstein’s engagement with English Fabianism led him to emphasize the proletariat’s differentiated nature. He claimed skilled workers most readily organized and became the first proletarians to develop class consciousness. Unskilled workers, on the other hand, remained largely unorganized and estranged from the socialist movement. Bernstein opposed the socialist political strategy of nationalization because it would subordinate unskilled workers to party revolutionaries rather than realize cooperative self-government in industry. This focus on promoting industrial self-government made Bernstein stress the importance of workers’ further unionization and adoption of skilled unionists’ method of collective bargaining. This would produce socialist cooperation because it facilitated cooperative wage determination. In Bernstein’s view, skilled unionists influenced the socialist party to take political action to organize and elevate more proletarians to class consciousness. In contrast to those who claim Bernstein prioritized the party’s autonomous ethical appeals and legislation, I emphasize his focus on union-party interactions and defense of unions as central for the advance into socialism’s cooperative society.

Building the car while driving it: organising platform workers in the e-hailing sector in Kenya

The global decline in union representation offers a grim picture of the future of labour. Nevertheless, the proliferation of platform worker protest and organisation is a reminder that today’s precarious workers may well become tomorrow’s unionised working class. Most platform worker organisations in the Global South have emerged outside of the trade union movement. However, there has been a growing trend towards hybridisation as unions shift their focus to the platform economy in the quest for revitalisation. Drawing on the Power Resources Approach, this article analyses the sources of worker power in the e-hailing sector and how the Transport Workers Union in Kenya has sought to leverage sources of power to improve the conditions of work and social reproduction. The article argues that organising the e-hailing sector is akin ‘to building a car while driving it’. It involves experimentation, learning and innovation. In contrast to other types of digital work, e-hailing is geographically tethered, giving workers structural power. However, in the context of widespread informality, their power can be easily undermined. Weak regulation and platform workers’ misclassification as self-employed pose a further challenge to collective action. Nevertheless, there are emerging forms of organisation, from associations to cooperatives to the trade union. Whether TWU will be able to leverage this moment to wage an offensive struggle against platform companies will depend on its ability to incorporate emerging organisations into its structures, develop new strategies for collective bargaining, and build alliances with other working-class movements.

Culture workers against big oil: the importance of labor education in fighting the climate crisis

This article argues for the importance of labor education in fighting the climate crisis, a vital form of education too often overlooked in the climate movement. Drawing on a case study of unionized culture workers in the United Kingdom, the article seeks to show the distinctive embedded nature of labor education. Success of labor education on the climate crisis hinges not so much on a particular pedagogy or curriculum in any one classroom setting, but on the ways in which a range of formal and informal educational actors and spaces work together across the labor and environmental movements, as part of a mobilizing project that seeks to link worker interests directly to the climate crisis, and identify actions that workers can take to address the crisis effectively. Labor education has a central role to play in ensuring a just transition in the move away from a fossil fuel based economy.

Indonesian Trade Unions' Strategic Response to Unilateral Employment Termination during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Bekasi City/Regency

This article investigates the resistance efforts of the All Indonesia Chemical Energy and Mining Workers Union (SP KEP SPSI) Bekasi in advocating for changes in cases of unilateral employment termination (PHK) at PT. Matahari Alka during the 2021 Covid-19 pandemic. This research primarily focuses on the analysis of SP KEP SPSI Bekasi's strategies and their success in challenging unilateral layoffs at PT. Alka Sun. Employing a qualitative approach, along with interviews conducted with SP KEP Bekasi Branch and Work Unit administrators within the company, this study, guided by Calvin Mackenzie's interest group strategy theory and Douglas McAdam's social movements theory, generates significant insights. The resistance undertaken by SP KEP SPSI Bekasi was rooted in the company's violations against workers, including unilateral layoffs that diverged from collective work agreement (PKB) provisions, non-payment of wages, and the prohibition of union activities. SP KEP SPSI's strategy encompassed demonstrations, lobbying of relevant authorities, and dialogue-based negotiations. The success of SP KEP SPSI Bekasi's strategy was closely linked to factors such as solidarity, which served as a foundation for strengthening the organization during these mobilizations, the union's capacity to motivate its members, and the formation of alliances.