Ian Hampson | International Unionism: Recovering History, Reshaping Theory, Recasting Practice? | Labour History, 87

Review Article

International Unionism: Recovering History, Reshaping Theory, Recasting Practice?

Ian Hampson^*

Anthony Carew, Michel Dreyfus, Geert. van Goethum, Rebecca Gubrell-McCormick, Marcel van der Linden (eds), The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, Peter Lang, Bern, 2000. pp. 624 US $102.95 cloth

Bart De Wilde (ed.), The Past and Future of International Trade Unionism, International Conference, Ghent, Belgium, May 19–20, 2000, International Association of Labour History Institutions and Archief en Museum van de Socialistische Arbeidersbeweging (IALHI and AMSAB). pp. 324 paper

Kim Moody, Workers in a Lean World: Unions in the International Economy, Verso, London, New York, 1997, pp. vii + 335 paper US $20 paper

Michael Gordon and Lowell Turner (eds), Transnational Cooperation Among Labor Unions, Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press, 2000. pp. xv + 310 US $50 cloth

Jeffrey Harrod and Robert O'Brien (eds), Global Unions? Theory and Strategies of Organized Labour in the Global Political Economy, Routledge, London, 2002. pp. xx + 282 £70 cloth

Introduction

The potential of international unionism is to provide a political counterweight to the ever-growing power of international capital, which has over the past 25 years rolled back many of the gains made by organised labour during the post-war 'long boom'. The topic is surprisingly under-researched, despite its salience to labour history, industrial relations, political economy and international relations. This may be because it has tended to inhabit the interstices of these discrete, and sometimes inwardly focused, disciplinary areas. In addition, crucial archival material has been lost or was until recently unavailable to historians.

These five books all address the topic of international unionism in the global political economy. The first book, by Carew et al., is a major historical study based on the newly catalogued archives of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), published on the fiftieth birthday of the ICFTU in 1999. The second, edited by De Wilde, is a collection of papers delivered in an international conference which addressed the recently released historical material thematically. The third book, by Kim Moody, is a monograph, dealing with the global crisis of organised labour and the working class, and advocating militant 'international social movement unionism'. The next two books: by Gordon and Turner, and Harrod and O'Brien respectively, are edited collections which address the changing nature of international unionism. Harrod and O'Brien make a strong case that new disciplinary fusions are necessary to understand both international unionism and industrial relations itself, given that the latter is increasingly shaped by events in the international sphere.

Globalisation, the Crisis of the Working Class, and Transnational Labour Collaboration

The internationalisation of production brings national 'social settlements' into competition, posing major challenges to national labour movements. Difficult enough as it is to achieve the 'common rule' in national industrial relations environments, imposing a 'transnational common rule', through international union action, is much more difficult. These issues are common ground to the five books under consideration here. Kim Moody paints a picture of globalisation and its consequences for the working class that would be widely accepted. Moody does not accept the left stereotype of the multinational corporation: footloose, mobile, able to play states, national labour movements and workers off against each other to impose a 'race to the bottom'. The political institutional framework of globalisation, Moody insists, is a political creation, much of it formed at national level, in particular through national trade and financial liberalisation policies, and as such, able to be reshaped by different political forces.

Gordon and Turner's book is divided into three parts. The first usefully explores a number of aspects of transnational labour union cooperation that are often overlooked. For example, Chapter 3, by Jean-Michel Servais, points out that transborder cooperation between unions is subject to legal regulations, and it is wise to be appraised of them before engaging in what potentially may be illegal activities. In many countries there are: restrictions on unions taking part in industrial action in support of unions in other countries; restrictions on unions receiving financial or other aid from other countries; restrictions on unions' operating in certain geographical regions; and so on. The chapter by the late Harvie Ramsay, provocatively entitled 'Know Thine Enemy', argues that labour organisations need a more comprehensive and accurate conception of transnational corporations than that of left folklore. Labour activists need to unpack notions of business strategy, which assume (unrealistically) 'rational management', access to copious information, and a large amount of time to analyse it. The chapter mostly consists of an explanation of various conceptions of corporate strategy, which all have different implications for corporate decision making, and knowing them can help union activists predict managerial moves, and design their own strategies.

The second part of the book sketches the structures, history and work of the ICFTU, the International Trades Secretariats (ITSs) and the European Council of Trade Unions (ETUC). The ICFTU is the sole significant international peak labour organisation — a confederation of national union centres, with member organisations from 213 countries, and covering 124 million members. It was formed in 1949, following the failure of international solidarity represented by the disintegration of the short-lived World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU). In addition to union peak bodies from western capitalist nations, the WFTU contained Christian and Communist union centres, and this was too much ideological tension for one organisation.

The ICFTU claims to speak for world labour 'in general', while the ITSs (discussed in Chapter 6) represent particular industrial sectors cross-nationally. ITSs are autonomous 'industrial' or occupational groupings, to which individual unions affiliate. One of the major tensions within the international union movement after World War II was over the role of these organisations 'within' the WFTU, and they went their own way after its breakup. They have always been more disposed towards direct action, confronting transnational corporations across nations and regions. But like most international union organisations, their impressive 'reach' is not matched by their power resources, notwithstanding some successes. The last part of the book sketches some of these successes.

Considering union strategy in national arenas, Turner and Gordon (pp. 5–6) argue that only where unions have been integrated as social partners into political and/or firm decision-making has membership remained stable. But this is unconvincing, because even in those countries cited as instances of such 'integration' — Japan and Germany — union density continues to decline. As if following this idea through, Kim Moody, contrary to Turner and Gordon, advocates a confrontationist stance. He deplores the paralysis of the working class in face of global economic restructuring, blaming this inactivity in large part on union leaders 'pathetic attempts to save jobs', conformity to the requirements of 'lean production' (pp. 2–3) and on national solutions to the unemployment crisis. Moody argues that union leaders at national level should derive inspiration from those elements of the world working class that have turned to rebellion, for example in South Korea, Brazil and elsewhere. Here, Moody undoubtedly exaggerates the extent of this 'rebellion'. He argues unions should embrace a new 'international social movement unionism', which should reach across borders and beyond unions to the working class as a whole, and should forge extra-class linkages with 'social movements' (like peace, environmental, feminist and other social activists). Unions in the North should 'look South', and far from seeing low paid workers on the 'periphery' of the global economy as 'the competition', they should extend solidarity.

Moody's Chapter 10 sketches the structure and history of the international labour movement, criticising the 'directionless giant' (p. 227). The ICFTU, Moody argues, has no global vision or strategy that would enable it to confront the international jobs crisis, work intensification under 'lean production', or the worldwide 'competitiveness agenda'. It concentrates most of its energy on fruitless activities like trying to persuade neo-liberal international agencies, like the World Trade Organisation (WTO), to implement social clauses and corporate codes of conduct. Further, the organisation has been taken over by conservative 'business unionism', driven by the American and Japanese peak union organisations, respectively the American Federation of Labor — Confederation of Industrial Organisations (AFL-CIO), and the Japan Trade Union Congress (JTUC/Rengo). The ITSs have a better sense of strategic direction, but mostly lack resources to tackle the transnational corporations in an effective manner. Moody follows up with some examples of actual international trade union cooperation.

Similarly, the final chapter of Turner and Gordon's book lays out an agenda for global unionism, but one fundamentally different to Moody's. Whilst there is a great and growing need for transnational collaboration in the global economy, they argue, there are formidable barriers to it, in particular differences in union structure, ideology and culture, and conflicting interests deriving from different levels of economic development. Organised labour, they argue, needs a stronger voice in the network of institutions that 'regulate' the global economy, in particular the WTO, OECD, IMF and World Bank. They also need to be involved at national level in tripartite formulation of policy. In addition, they need to develop links to other social movements and groups that have had little contact with organised labour in the past. In summary, these are two books that share much in common in terms of defining and documenting the problems affecting organised labour, and proposing forms of transnational union cooperation, but the tensions between them are instructive, revealing the difficulty of arriving at a political strategy for organised labour in a 'globalised' environment.

Recovering History: the Emergence and Development of International Unionism

The massive study by Carew et al. is a major addition to the historical literature. Its strength derives from the vast array of recently released archival information it has drawn on to document the politics of international unionism. At the same time, however, the main claim of the book, that it gives 'a comprehensive picture of the rise of the international trade union movement during the twentieth century, and highlighted its organisation vicissitudes' (p. 521) is questionable, because the study, as its title would suggest, is focused on the ICFTU, and neglects other international union organisations. While the World Confederation of Labour (WCL) and the WFTU are now marginal, the same cannot be said of the ITSs, which have developed innovative methods of confrontating transnational corporations. Nor is this a 'warts and all' history of the ICFTU, and, one feels, some disgraceful episodes do not get the treatment they deserve. Foremost among these must be counted the ICFTU's siding with conservatism, and its opposition to 'communist' unions, even when these constituted the only viable champions of workers interests. Even so, this is a truly impressive research document, and the book is now required reading for those concerned with the history of the ICFTU, and international unionism more generally.

The book is structured chronologically, and takes the reader through the formation and development of the ICFTU and its antecedents. The various chapters are written by different authors, with different degrees of access to relevant and well-organised source material. For example, researchers writing about the ICFTU have access to that body's recently catalogued archives, while the archives of another important international union organisation, the International Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU), have disappeared.

The first chapter by Michael Dreyfus discusses the early development of international trade unionism, from 1902 to 1919. Dreyfus locates the beginning of international trade unionism in 1864, with the formation of the International Working Men's Association (IWMA) four years after the signing of a free trade pact between France and Britain. Union organisations were divided over the responses to capitalist industrialisation, particularly its international aspects. In particular there were divisions over socialism's form and viability between German social democratic reformism (itself riven by conflicts between Luxembourgian, Leninist and Bernsteinian accounts of the role of unions in socialist revolution), Southern European anarcho-syndicalism (reflecting its then scant experience with industrialisation) and British craft unionism. The predominant British view saw internationalism as associated with socialism. Notwithstanding the British, internationalism entailed what Dreyfus calls 'naïve optimism' — the belief in the possibility of the rational reorganisation of society along socialist lines (p. 31). This did not embrace Christian trade unionism, which did not emerge till 1919, in different circumstances (p. 39). From 1906 the American Federation of Labor (AFL), led by Samuel Gompers, played a major role, blocking attempts to join by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and the Canadian union centre, reflecting the AFL's desire to be the sole representative of North American labour (p. 57). World War I disappointed those who argued that working-class internationalism could effectively counter nationalism.

At the crucial Amsterdam conference, which constituted the new IFTU, in 1919, the Dutch activist Edo Fimmen argued for a new start in international union organisation. According to Fimmen, trade unions have a social and political mission as well as a purely economic role. Fimmen advocated the general strike and international boycott as weapons in international labour's arsenal — particularly against resurgent militarism. Fimmen also advocated a new International Labour Organisation (ILO), which should have the ability to pass binding international laws. The ICFTU even called for the socialisation of the means of production. The Americans retreated into isolationism, initially refusing to join either the ILO or the League of Nations, notwithstanding that the League was the American President's idea! From the communist unions' point of view, the ICFTU's social democratic position was not radical enough. Thus the Red International of Labor Unions (RILU) was formed in 1921, and competed for the allegiance of communist-oriented trade unionists in Europe. Fimmen resigned in 1923, arguing that the ITSs should join the IFTU and lead international action. He pronounced the IFTU structure (the peak body of national peak bodies) as 'out of date' (p. 97) and argued that it should be replaced by an organisation of (industrial, not national) ITSs. Fimmen's resignation ushered in the reign of Walter Citrine, whose vision of the role of trade unions was much closer to that of Gompers (p. 111). In particular, Citrine rejected communism, and soon the program of the IFTU had lost any reference to the socialisation of the means of production.

Carew's next chapters discuss the issues dividing the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU) during the 1945–49 period. Divisions occurred over the role of Marshall Plan aid, which the communists saw as drawing Europe into the emerging Western bloc. Communists criticised western unions for helping preserve capitalism, rather than help transform it into socialism (p. 183). Then the bulk of the Western interests walked out of the WFTU, leaving it to be the vehicle for Eastern bloc trade unionism. As the WFTU was disintegrating, the AFL's 'Free Trade Union Committee' began receiving Central Intelligence Agency aid to help wage the cold war against communist trade unionists anywhere in the world (p. 189). Thus the ICFTU became tied too closely to USA foreign policy, and its Latin American arm, ORIT (Organisatión Regional Interamericana de Trabajadores), attracted much criticism for supporting authoritarian regimes in Latin America (p. 316). There, the ICFTU faced ambiguous policy imperatives, with many countries ruled by repressive regimes, but with the opposition 'free' unions often dominated by communists. The AFL-CIO was generally prepared to overlook the repressive nature of certain anticommunist regimes. This caused questioning of its credentials, most notably when (as is mentioned in a footnote, on p. 454) ORIT put out a press release congratulating Pinochet on the Chilean coup!

The chapters by Rebecca Gumbrell-McCormick note that from about 1972 unions in developed countries contributed to a modest revival of left politics, aimed at regulating international economic activity and reducing inequalities (p. 379). This posed a policy dilemma: supporting workers in developed domestic economies (eg through tariffs) might oppose the interests of workers in developing countries. The solution advocated by America's Walter Reuther was to support collective bargaining in developing countries with the aim of gradually standardising wages and working conditions and thus remove the incentive for capital movement. Against this, governments were increasingly reducing trade union rights in an attempt to attract investment, and limiting through legislation the ability of trade unions to carry out cross-border sympathy strikes.

Another arena of international union activity was the development, implementation and policing of labour standards through the ILO. The ICFTU was influential in the formation of many ILO conventions and declarations. It also proposed in 1973 the inclusion of a 'social clause' as part of General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) agreements, and it discussed the regulation of transnational corporations with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Certain of its prescriptions for transnational corporate regulation were incorporated in the influential Brandt Report. But by the end of the 1970s, conservative governments were in the ascendancy in developed countries, and the project of international corporate regulation fell into disrepair. During this period, the ICFTU concentrated much attention on the South African situation, organising international publicity and boycotts of South African ships.

The big changes of the late 1980s and early 1990s — the collapse of the Soviet bloc, and the acceleration of neoliberalism — posed major challenges for the ICFTU. The ICFTU seemed to accept that there was no alternative to free trade in a globalised liberalised economy, and the best that could be expected was to protect worker rights within it to the greatest extent possible. One possibility was attaching a social clause to trade liberalisation agreements under the auspices of the WTO (formed in 1996). The social clause contained the 'core' labour standards, which, it was argued, would not impede competitiveness in any country — a position not accepted by developing countries, which often saw the proposal as disguised protectionism. With the failure of the social clause initiative, and scant success regulating transnational corporate behaviour through codes of conduct, the ICFTU lost much enthusiasm for trade liberalisation, and drifted closer to the ITSs. The ITSs and ICFTU worked closely together on some common disputes and utilised 'comprehensive corporate campaigns', for example those against Rio Tinto in Australia and South Africa. The ICFTU may be increasingly, if haltingly, turning to a more confrontationist stance with respect to transnational corporations, realising that nothing else has achieved very much.

The Historical Study in the Present Situation

The second of the five books under review is a collection of papers presented in a colloquium in May 2000 which was designed to address thematically the above historical study from the point of view of the current situation. As with most collections, the contributions are of uneven quality. Bill Jordan, the current President of the ICFTU, introduces the book by noting that national problems are increasingly related to global institutions and events. Thus, logically, there should be a growing engagement by national unions in international trade union work. This requires new ideas and thinking outside the straight jacket of tradition (p. 18).

The first substantive chapter, by Bob Reinalda addresses the structure of the international trade union movement, identifying tensions between national sovereignty and internationalism within the ICFTU. He points out that Samuel Gompers made respect for US sovereignty a condition of AFL affiliation, and argues that this principle, if extended to all participants, effectively means decisions have to be taken by consensus. This structural problem greatly weakened the interventionist powers of the organisation. An alternative model, proposed by Edo Fimmen in 1924, was for national trade unions to affiliate to the ITSs, rather than through national centres. This would have eliminated much of the national element from trade union internationalism. But the nationalism of the first half of the twentieth century ensured that this and other supranational endeavours would never find purchase. After World War II the USA unashamedly pursued its foreign policy objectives through the American Institute for Free Labor Development (AIFLD), while other imperialist powers enlisted their domestic peak union bodies as foreign policy instruments. Moreover, in the field of international diplomacy, the ICFTU, ostensibly concentrating its efforts on labour standards setting and implementation through the ILO, also used its influence to exclude rival international union centres (the WCL and WFTU) from influence. This has tainted the whole project of international unionism, and even the role of the United Nations. This informative and sophisticated chapter concludes by asserting that the history of the ICFTU reveals the need for a new international trade union movement anatomy, independent of the major powers, and with a full grasp of the complex international system.

This is explored further in the next chapter (written by Geert Van Goethem) through the debates in the 1920s between Edo Fimmen and Jan Oedegeest. Fimmen saw the danger of fragmentation through union representation via national centres. He saw it as the mission of the ITSs to prevent international working-class fragmentation through direct action. Oedegeest on the other hand affirmed national representation, and saw the ICFTU as a kind of international workers' parliament. Fimmen found it impossible to preserve ICFTU unity in the face of cross-cutting ideological views of the role of unions in Britain, Europe and Russia. Peter Waterman's chapter, similarly, argues that the present structure of the international union movement is out of place in the new globalised world. The form of organisation appropriate here is not the international bureaucracy, but a loose network, oriented towards permanent dialogue, and including the social movements. Waterman is scathing about international unionism's complicity in the Cold War and with the imperialist agendas of the USA in particular. Like Moody, Waterman favours the recasting of the international labour movement as 'social movement unionism', which learns from other social movements, and forms strong links with them.

Jelle Visser's chapter argues that, paradoxically, European unions have become stronger in Brussels, but weaker in the workplace. Union density has declined in most countries, along with militancy, the wages share, and employment security. But in Europe, unionism was strengthened, as the 'social partners' gained influence on the European Parliament and Council of Ministers. ETUC in 1973 became the only international union centre that represented the diverse currents of unionism: 'free', communist, and Christian. But the Maastricht Treaty of 1991 enabled Britain to 'opt out' of the social dimension, and thus the European Union failed to prevent 'regime competition'.

The chapter by Christine Collette asks if the ICFTU (and its antecedents) was a social movement. On the one hand, initial efforts within the movement were concentrated on anti-fascism and preventing war, through the potential, but unused, weapons of the national strike and boycott. On the other, the movement was never particularly 'gender friendly', and female trade unionists had to fight to be heard, and had to develop their own associations 'within' the movement. Richard Hyman's chapter also discusses the representativeness of international trade unionism, and mentions some home truths. Solidarity, he argues, depends on perceptions of commonalities of interest and purpose. But diverse conceptions of the role(s) of trade unionism have inhibited the achievement of cross-national commonality. And the 'fundament of trade union effectiveness' is their members 'willingness to act' (p. 123). While the international trade union movement has numbers ...

By what warrant can it claim to represent them? Only insofar as they are aware of its existence, endorse its campaigning objectives, and are perhaps prepared to take action in support of these, can it be considered representative in the strong meaning of the term. Achieving representativeness in this sense remains a challenge for the future (Hyman, p. 125).

Anthony Carew addresses one of the fundamental issues raised in the historical sweep through international (and other forms of) unionism: the relation to socialism. He observes deep division on this issue, noting charges of treason against the ICFTU, historically deriving in part from the IFTU's failure to deal with the RILU. He justifies the IFTU's rejection of the RILU by pointing to the latter's 'entryism', lying, and so on, all the while acting as a transmission belt for instructions from the Comintern. The next chapter reports the results of PhD research on the RILU, which argues that the RILU did good work before it became absorbed into Bolshevism. Then the discussion shifts to the concept of 'free' as in 'free trade unions', noting the different meanings the term holds for different actors. This is not just an academic question, because 'unfree' trade unions are excluded by definition from the ICFTU. The question arises in one of the most pressing issues to confront the ICFTU — whether to admit or refuse the All China Conferation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) to the ranks of the ICFTU. The problem is the ACFTU is clearly a state-controlled union movement. On the other hand, China's entry to the WTO and the rule-based trading system, will force workers in other countries to compete with goods made by Chinese labour in conditions that do not respect basic labour freedoms. 'Constructive engagement' would allow the ACFTU access to expertise in the ICFTU, and help build the ability of Chinese workers to defend their own interests — and undercut the impact of low labour costs on labour conditions in other countries. Anthony Woodiwiss argues that the position of Chinese labour is better supported in relatively recent Chinese labour law than is commonly appreciated, although, Woodiwiss argues, the extent to which labour rights are enforced on the ground is not known. Woodiwiss suggests that trade unions would be the logical 'enforcers' of such rights, although they have little experience at this, given their past roles as agents of the state.

Marcel van der Linden's conclusion to the book argues that the international trade union movement is now in a transition phase. Such transitions have happened before. He acknowledges that the weaknesses of 'national' internationalism are glaring. There are many challenges to which the national models have no convincing answers. There is likely to emerge a new form of 'transnational internationalism', which would appeal to a broader section of workers, would be neither hierarchical nor bureaucratic, and would support many different kinds of militancy, in addition to international labour standards. The future is uncertain, but these stimulating papers have played a role in elucidating the forces that influence it.

Reshaping Theory

Harrod and O'Brien have co-edited a very useful collection of essays on labour in the global political economy. One gets the impression the authors were encouraged to be a little speculative and adventurous. This is sometimes achieved at the expense of scholarly excellence, theoretical 'neatness' and comprehensiveness, but the overall product, I would say, is required reading for all who are concerned with the theoretical and political challenges posed for organised labour by globalisation, and the inadequacy of traditional theoretical tools to deal with them. Indeed, this is the book's central rationale: that the factors shaping industrial relations are increasingly international in nature — the rise of the transnational corporation and the growth of an international complex of institutions — as well as a transnational market — which is hostile to unionism and increasingly influences the state. Thus labour organisations play an increasing role at the interface of international institutions and the state. The authors thus argue for an interdisciplinary approach which unites 'the two IRs' — industrial relations and international relations. If they are correct (and I am persuaded), then the book should find a place on the bookshelves of international relations scholars as well.

The questions the book addresses are very challenging. Is organised labour better to cooperate with transnational corporations in quest of international competitiveness, en route inserting itself into corporate and political decision making, or to directly confront corporate power? Should unions concentrate on international activities, or confine themselves to the domestic sphere, and seek to influence state policy? What role should international representative labour organisations play in the complex of institutions at the heartland of neo-liberal globalisation? And what theoretical tools and innovations are necessary to understand all this? Chapter 2 enlists Karl Polanyi to argue that the firm is not a 'rational black box' divorced from its social roots, but a site of contest, embedded in — nay, 'constituted by' — a social order. Firms should therefore be examined as to their relations to institutions and practices in state-societies, social relations between firms and similar actors, and social relations within the firm. Links are drawn to 'institutionalist' analysis and the 'types of capitalism' literatures. The chapter's objective — to open up for consideration the ways in which labour groups are or may contest the shape of restructuring — is well achieved. Harrod alerts us that power relations in production give rise to 'rationalities', ideologies and world views and institutionalised practices that mitigate the acceptance of authority. The development of 'counter rationalities' is therefore an important part of social change. Again Polanyi is deployed to remind us that institutions (like trade unions) arise to protect 'society' against free market forces. The shape of these institutions partly defines the nature of modern capitalisms. Unfortunately however, argues Harrod, industrial relations theory did not accommodate this insight, and the development of typologies of capitalism passed to other disciplines.

Chapter 4, by Haworth and Hughes, takes up the argument that industrial relations needs to take better account of the nature of transnational capital and supranational organisations, and seeks to develop some conceptual equipment appropriate to that end. Since Bretton Woods laid down the foundations of the world economy, and Dunlop, Kerr et al. laid down the foundations of IR theory, the former had changed greatly, but the latter had not. The internationalisation of production increasingly influenced industrial relations practices, and domestic policy frameworks with them, whilst industrial relations theory maintained an 'inward and downward focus' (p. 68). International relations and international political economy rarely featured in industrial relations analysis, to the latter's detriment. Haworth and Hughes therefore propose the concept of an 'international industrial relations regime'. The concept of an 'international regime' is part of international relations theory, developed by Krasner. It is an international complex of institutions and agreed practices and principles, in an area where national sovereignty restricts the capacities of international law. The concept may be useful to register the ways in which national, international, and supranational factors intersect in the determination of industrial relations outcomes.

Part two shifts to a discussion of strategy and other aspects of transnational organising. Chapter 5, by Andrew Herod, questions the widely-held belief that cross-national organising is the only way to confront transnational corporations. He argues that, first, transnational corporations are not infinitely mobile, and are often attracted to particular locations for nationally particular reasons, notably the presence of a skilled labour force. But, and second, the much-vaunted 'time space compression' and the 'speeded up' nature of corporate operations, may increase the turnover of capital, but it also makes corporations vulnerable to localised industrial action. The organisation of production in transnational chains dependent on 'just in time' delivery associated with 'lean production' means the same thing. Therefore, argues Herod, labour organisations should not neglect the possibilities of local action.

Chapter 7, by Ian Robinson, identifies three phases of union strategy in Canada and the USA since World War II. In the first, which Robinson calls 'embedded fordism', unions concentrated on their positions within 'fordist' (Keynesian) national regulation. In the second, unions concentrated on protecting their position within isolated national economies, for example by advocating protectionism. In the third, unions realised the futility of trying to protect national fordisms, and called for international regulations to protect their position. By 2000, they accepted 'globalisation', but tried to shape the latter's development away from its current neo-liberal form. This entailed increased cooperation with the ICFTU, and increased emphasis on 'internationalism'. Chapter 9, by Haworth and Hughes, addresses some tensions at the supranational level within the Asia Pacific Economic Council (APEC) region, and ask whether regionalisation will nurture greater labour cooperation? The APEC agenda, they tell us, has been concentrated around trade liberalisation, but there is an APEC Human Resource Development Working Group (APEC HRDWG), which although concerned mainly with the training of managers and similar topics, and not the development and implementation of labour standards, at the same time provides some latitude to raise the latter issues. Indeed, increased concern within APEC about the lack of a social dimension to regionalisation, in particular following the Asian financial crisis of 1997, provides some impetus for this. This creates an opportunity for internationally organised labour, but there is also a challenge. China's entry to the WTO and to APEC means that Chinese delegates will be sent to the APEC HRDWG. These delegates will be from the ACFTU. However, relations between the ACFTU and the ICFTU raise delicate issues, as discussed above.

Chapter 12, by Rorden Wilkinson, is a strong and significant chapter, which details how the voice of organised labour came to be excluded from the current global institutional complex (the WTO, OECD, World Bank and International Monetary Fund [IMF]). Wilkinson describes how the original plans for the post-war global economic architecture included an institutionalised presence for the ILO. The ILO was to be linked to an organisation called the International Trade Organisation (ITO), in turn linked to the IMF and World Bank, with the objects of promoting orderly economic expansion and reconstruction, consistent with 'fair labour standards' (it was to be the job of the ILO to define these), full employment and balance of payments equilibria. This was laid out after a World Economic Conference, which took place at Havana, from 1947–48. Here was a design for a rule-bound system of international trade which had the protection of labour standards at its centre! How different the world might have been. However, the USA would not ratify the agreement, and the successive rounds of the GATT came to fill the gap left by the stillborn ITO until the formation of the WTO from 1996. This latter organisation rejected any role in defining — much less policing — labour standards, and in consequence there is no strongly institutionalised body in the heartland of global economic governance, that can raise concerns about the social impact of neo-liberal globalisation.

Chapter 14 is written by Dan Gallin, a labour activist with long experience in the international labour movement. The main weakness, for Gallin, of the international labour movement is the dearth of an ideology. Anti-communism can no longer provide sufficient glue for the organisation, and social democracy 'has interiorised neo-liberalism' (p. 239). Morover, the ICFTU is structurally compromised. The ITSs are stronger, and have had some successes in certain international campaigns. Gallin makes the same suggestion that Edo Fimmen made in 1924, that the ITSs should join the ICFTU. The movement needs to be politicised, so that members feel themselves to be part of it. Democratic socialism needs to be reinvigorated as an alternative to neoliberalism. Inspiration, Gallin argues, can be found in the union movements of the South, which have taken responsibility for social reform, and developed political programs for action.

Conclusion

International unionism is an important field of study. The release of the wealth of historical documentation contained in Carew et al., should provide a treasure trove for historians of the international labour movement — with the proviso, already mentioned, that this material is focused on the ICFTU to the exclusion of other international union organisations, some of them (it could be argued) equally, if not more important. The conference which addressed this material, canvassed in de Wilde's edited collection, to some extent balances this by canvassing a wider range of international union organisations and possibilities. It is to be hoped that this new historical material fertilises the historical study of international unionism. But new theorisations of the latter are also needed, in particular within industrial relations which has for too long failed to address developments in adjacent fields, especially comparative political economy and international relations. In consequence, the national focus of industrial relations has limited its usefulness for understanding processes that are transnational in their origins.

The theoretical syntheses and disciplinary cross-fertilisations charted in Harrod and O'Brien's book are strong contributions to the theoretical regeneration of industrial relations, which could even lead to viable proposals to tame the international political economy by inserting the concerns of workers into its institutional heartland. Methods to this end might range from lobbying transnational institutions to forms of direct action. The revitalised theoretical perspectives towards which these volumes point, it is also to be hoped, will stimulate contemporary case-studies of international unionism in action. In this way international union practice itself may be reshaped as well as its historical representations and theoretical understanding.

GLOSSARY

ACFTU	All China Conferation of Trade Unions
AFL-CIO	American Federation of Labor — Confederation of Industrial Organisations
AFL	American Federation of Labor
AIFLD	American Institute for Free Labor Development
APEC	Asia Pacific Economic Council
APEC HRDWG	APEC Human Resource Development Working Group
APEC	Asia Pacific Economic Council
ETUC	European Council of Trade Unions
GATT	General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
IWW	Industrial Workers of the World
ICFTU	International Confederation of Free Trade Unions
IFTU	International Federation of Trade Unions
ILO	International Labour Organisation
IMF	International Monetary Fund
ITO	International Trade Organisation
ITSs	International Trades Secretariats
IWMA	International Working Men's Association
IWW	Industrial Workers of the World
JTUC/Rengo	Japan Trade Union Congress
OECD	Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development
ORIT	Organisatión Regional Interamericana de Trabajadores
RILU	Red International of Labor Unions
WCF	World Confederation of Labour
WFTU	World Federation of Trade Unions
WTO	World Trade Organisation

Endnotes

^*�I would like to thank the two anonymous referees who reviewed this paper for Labour History.

Content in the History Cooperative database is intended for personal, noncommercial use only. You may not reproduce, publish, distribute, transmit, participate in the transfer or sale of, modify, create derivative works from, display, or in any way exploit the History Cooperative database in whole or in part without the written permission of the copyright holder.