Trade Unions and Labour Movements in the Asia-Pacific Region

Byoung-Hoon Lee, Ng Sek-Hong, Russell Lansbury, Byoung-Hoon Lee, Ng Sek-Hong, Russell D Lansbury

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9780429576089
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Economia
• Subtopic: Economia del lavoro

Recent developments in the world economy, including deindustrialisation and the digital revolution, have led to an increasingly individualistic relationship between workers and employers, which in turn has weakened labour movements and worker representation. However, this process is not universal, including in some countries of Asia, where trade unions are closely aligned with the interests of the dominant political party and the state. This book considers the many challenges facing trade unions and worker representation in a wide range of Asian countries. For each country, full background is given on how trade unions and other forms of worker representation have arisen. Key questions then considered include the challenges facing trade unions and worker representation in each country, the extent to which these are a result of global or local developments and the actions being taken by trade unions and worker representative bodies to cope with the challenges.

This book is dedicated to the memory of Professor Keith Thurley, London School of Economics.

Part 1
Introduction

1 Refining varieties of unions and labour movements

Perspectives from the Asia-Pacific region

Russell D. Lansbury, Byoung-Hoon Lee and Sek-Hong Ng

Trade unions and labour movements in many countries within the Asia-Pacific region are confronted with critical challenges, derived mainly from global socio-economic trends, including post-industrialisation and digital revolution which are transforming the world around us. Globalisation, which may be characterised as a process of increasing worldwide interconnectedness across national boundaries, has led to a significant shift in the power relations between employers and workers (Bamber et al. 2016, Buchholz et al. 2009). Within the globalising environment, employers have been able to impose greater market risks and labour flexibility on their employees, resulting in an asymmetric labour-management relationship (Baccaro and Howell 2011, Hyman 2007). Neoliberal policies have also weakened the collectivist identity of working people and have strengthened attempts by employers and governments to individualise the post-industrial employment relationship (Peetz 2010). These structural transformations have contributed to the growing social inequality and rendered working people’s lives more vulnerable throughout the world (Applebaum et al. 2010). The weakening of labour movements, particularly trade unions, has been a consequence of these global trends.

Labour movements, which protected and enhanced working people’s lives during the earlier era of industrialisation, have been exposed to a variety of internal problems in the era of globalising post-industrialisation. However, five phenomena that Rose (1993) identified as core problems facing labour unions more than two decades ago remain relevant to the current situation in many countries, including those in the Asia-Pacific region, namely:

• Contraction – as union membership continues to decline;
• Pacification – as unions’ collective action, including strikes, has decreased;
• De-institutionalisation – as unions’ legal rights have been further restricted;
• Exclusion – as unions increasingly are excluded from workplace governance and the state’s policymaking processes;
• Demoralisation – as unions’ societal credibility and public image have been eroded.

Unions have also suffered from ‘institutional sclerosis’, as their bureaucratised operations have not dealt effectively with radically changing environments (Pocock 1998). In addition, unions are criticised for narrowing their representational protection to ‘insiders’ (members) and excluding unorganised ‘outsiders’, thereby creating a crisis of solidarity in labour movements. As a consequence, some unions have metamorphised into a self-interested weapon of organised workers groups, rather than providing a democratic voice for the entire working class and being a ‘sword of justice’ (Lee 2011). However, while unionisation appears to be in retreat in its traditional heartland of Europe and the Americas, the number of union members has been growing in some regions of the world such as South Asia. Furthermore, unionisation has also been increasing in some industries such as professional football players’ associations around the world, including Asia (Dabscheck 2017).

Varieties of unions and labour movements

The attenuation of labour movements is not uniform across the world. As the ‘varieties of capitalism’ (VoC) perspective indicates, the impact of globalisation on labour markets and working people’s lives varies across countries, since it is filtered by different institutional foundations of national political economies (Hall and Soskice 2001). For instance, globalisation appears to have had a more damaging effect on unions in liberal market economies (e.g., the United States and the United Kingdom) than their counterparts in some coordinated market economies (e.g., Germany and the Nordic countries; Thelen 2001). The intensity and concrete forms of challenges, posed to labour movements by mega-trends, vary across countries and are influenced by both the context of national institutional foundations and the historical traditions of unionism and worker activism in each country. Hence, many unions have developed and implemented diverse strategies in order to cope with crises arising from various external challenges and internal problems, as they seek to revitalise labour movements. Frege and Kelly (2003) identify six strategies for the revitalisation of the labour movement in the current global economy, namely: organising, labour-management partnership, political action, reform of union structures, coalition-building and international solidarity. Comparing five Western countries, they argue that renewal strategies adopted by unions vary in accordance with the differing political economy models of institutional arrangements which exist (Frege and Kelly 2003).

The ‘varieties of unionism’ (VoU) perspective has both academic and practical relevance to the strategic choices regarding labour movement revitalisation. However, this perspective also has limitations. Like the ‘VoC’ typologies, which are largely focused on the advanced market economies, the ‘VoU’ perspective is primarily based on the situation and experiences of unions in Western developed countries. Thus, it is debatable whether either the ‘VoU’ or ‘VoC’ perspectives can be applied to the different contexts of developing countries and state-led economies. Wright et al. (2017) have noted the limitations of the ‘varieties’ approach when comparing either national systems or union movements and argued for the a novel multi-scaled analytical framework which would take into account the influence of the institutional dynamics of industrial sectors and global production networks as well as national systems. This approach would look beyond the VoC and VoU perspectives to embrace a more dynamic and diverse array of regulatory systems, including the gig economy and other developments in the world of work and employment relations.

Currently, the capitalist market economic system is dominant, with only a few exceptions. Globalisation accelerated after the fall of the Socialist Bloc in the late 1980s and fostered the integration of non-Western countries into the world market. However, there exist greater varieties of capitalist market economies than the VoC literature assumes. Although many non-Western countries embrace the common governing logic and institutional foundations of the capitalist market economy, the concrete forms and features of their market economies not only differ from the Western advanced countries but are also heterogeneous. They vary in accordance with their historical trajectory, their levels of industrialisation and economic development, the nature of their political regimes, the extent of democratisation, sociocultural traditions and ethnic composition. Hence, labour movements in non-Western countries have distinctive socio-economic status in their relationships with the state, labour-capital power balance and their labour market structures, which are different from most Western advanced countries. In many developing economies, labour movements are often a junior partner of the authoritarian state and are subject to exploitative anti-labour practices imposed by foreign capital or state-business coalitions. They also have to deal with pre-modern issues derived from the extensive presence of the informal labour market. Confronted with the common threats of globalisation, which can render working people’s lives vulnerable, unions and collective workers groups in the non-Western countries have tried to revitalise their labour movements like their counterparts in the Western advanced countries However, labour movements take different approaches which reflect their distinctive national contexts.

This volume aims to broaden a research horizon of the ‘VoU’ perspective, by comparing labour movements of thirteen countries in the Asia-Pacific region. In geographical terms, six countries in our volume are located in Southeast Asia: Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam and Singapore. Five countries are in East Asia: China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan and South Korea. India represents South Asia and Australia the Pacific. The Asia-Pacific region has become an engine of global economic growth and includes very diverse ethnic, sociocultural and economic communities. The thirteen countries in this volume reflect the great diversity of the Asia-Pacific region in many respects: China and India are the two giant developing economies. Since the Deng Xiaoping era, China has been transformed from a socialist economy into a state-led market economy, still under government restrictions, but with a vigorous form of Chinese-style capitalism. By contrast, India has followed a long tradition of quasi-democratic socialism, particularly under the Congress Party when it was led by Indira Gandhi, but has changed to Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led governments, in recent times, without experiencing major political unrest. Vietnam is one of the most populous countries in the region and is following a similar but different path to China in terms of a state-led market economy. Hong Kong and Taiwan are both in the shadow of China, each seeking to maintain or develop democratic institutions while being economically connected to China. South Korea was one of the first successful newly industrialising economies (NIEs) in Asia and is following a similar economic trajectory to Japan. Other countries in the region: Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and, to a certain extent, the Philippines, represent successful examples of the second generation of Asian NIEs. Japan, Singapore and Australia are the wealthiest and most advanced economies in the region. Japan was the first industrialised Asian country, Singapore is an affluent but small city state, while Australia is building a multicultural society and becoming more integrated with Asia, while maintaining strong historical ties to Europe. The trading relationship with China is a common feature of all the Asian economies covered in this book. All have a strong economic interaction with China which can be complicated by political considerations as China seeks to exert its influence in the region.

Given the diverse historical backgrounds and institutional foundations of their political economies, the thirteen country cases in this book provide a good opportunity to explore varieties of labour movements from a broader comparative perspective. In order to facilitate comparisons of the evolution of different labour movements, their priorities and causal factors of their success and failure, a common research framework was developed. The authors of each country chapter have addressed the following questions in various ways:

1. What has been the recent evolution of labour movement in each country?
2. What are core challenges confronting the labour movement both within and outside workers’ organisations?
3. What strategic actions are being taken by the labour movement in response to the challenges in each country?
4. What has the labour movement achieved or failed to achieve, and what are major factors influencing these outcomes?
5. What theoretical implications can be drawn from case studies of labour movements in each country in order to further develop the VoU perspective?

Based upon this common framework, the country chapters in this book shed light on specific topics covered in the VoU in the Asia-Pacific region. Faced with different challenges and distinctive national contexts, labour unions and workers groups have taken diverse strategic approaches towards the revitalisation of labour movements.

The Asia-Pacific context

Asia has become one of the most dynamic regions of the world as economic growth reached an average of 7.6% between 2007 and 2017, which was double the global rate during this period. Labour productivity (defined as output per worker) increased by an average of 5% annually, which was also double the global average. According to a recent International Labour Organisation (ILO) Report, the region has both the world’s largest proportion of workers in the working-age population and lowest unemployment rate (ILO 2018).

Yet despite these impressive statistics, there is great variation between countries in the region. In 2017, more than one quarter of families lived in moderate to extreme poverty and nearly one in two workers remained in vulnerable employment (with little job security), while two in every three workers were in informal employment. Few countries in the region have a fully functioning social protection system which can help to stabilise household income levels and ease the impact of economic shocks, such as another global economic recession.

It is important to avoid over-generalising about the Asia-Pacific region which encompasses over forty countries, each of which has its own history, culture, social norms, natural resources and political institutions. This book covers thirteen countries in the region with an emphasis on those located in East and Southeast Asia, with India representing South Asia and Australia as the sole Pacific nation. Yet the countries in this book demonstrate the diversity of income levels, labour markets and worker representation through trade unions and other forms of organisation which seek to give workers a voice in determining their wages and conditions.

Some upper middle-income economies in the region, such as Australia, Japan, Singapore and South Korea, have made significant progress in export-led growth but still have workers in vulnerable jobs and under-employment. Middle-income economies, such as China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Malaysia, have followed successful growth strategies which are based on macroeconomic policies but have paid relatively little attention to social welfare development and labour market governance. The industrialising, lower middle-income countries, such as India, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines, also have enjoyed high economic growth rates but still have many in their workforces in vulnerable employment and in moderate to extreme poverty. Even within countries which have experienced great economic progress in recent years, such as South Korea and Taiwan, there is a growing disconnect between growth and inclusiveness, measured by income inequality (ILO 2018)

The ILO Report on Asia-Pacific Employment and Social Outlook (2018) highlighted the barriers that exist to achieving the United Nation’s Strategic Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030. This Report also argued that economic growth in the region is built on fragile foundations and needs to be refocussed on the four pillars of the ILO’s Decent Work Agenda: promoting decent jobs, guaranteeing rights at work, extending social protection and promoting social dialogue. But there is scant attention paid in the ILO Report to the need to strengthen collective bargaining rights which can only be achieved if there are strong and effective trade unions or other forms of worker collectives which can bargain on their behalf. Labour market institutions and laws are necessary to provide workers with the ability to negotiate better wages and conditions as well as giving them a voice in managerial decisions which affect them in the workplace.

This book seeks to provide an assessment of unions and other forms of worker representation in the Asia-Pacific region by examining the situation in thirteen countries. The key issues raised in relation to the varieties of labour movements in each of the thirteen countries are briefly summarised below and then examined in greater depth in the chapters which follow.

Case studies from the Asia-Pacific region

In Australia, trade unions have experienced declining membership from a peak of 60% of all wage earners forty years ago to a current density of less than 15%. Various reasons have been advanced for this decline including structural change of the economy and the workforce as well as legal reforms introduced by conservative governments to curb union power. The union movement has employed a number of strategies seeking to arrest and reverse its membership decline, including union mergers and active organising drives, but these have achieved only limited success. Yet unions still exercise political influence through the Australian Labor Party, and continue to play an important role as an advocate for wage earners in industrial tribunals. Although there has been the growth of social movements which seek to advance workers’ rights, there remain major challenges to revitalise and reform the union movement. Unions in Australia have sought greater engagement with their counterparts in Asia and the Pacific, as the region becomes more economically integrated.

Workers in China face a very different situation to most countries in the region, with the exception of Vietnam, as the government recognises only one trade union: The All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) is effectively an organ of the state. However, with the decline of state-owned enterprises and the emergence of local and foreign-owned private companies, workers have engaged in unofficial strikes, particularly in manufacturing, in order to seek increased wages and improved working conditions. New forms of organisation and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have been formed to support Chinese workers. Yet their future depends on whether the Chinese government continues to tolerate or decide to suppress alternatives to the official trade union movement and permit greater independence of the ACFTU from the state.

The unionisation rate in Hong Kong (known as a Special Administr...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• List of contributors
• Foreword
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations
• PART 1 Introduction
• PART 2 Country chapters
• PART 3 Conclusion
• Index