Union democracy

Edelstein, J. David, and Malcolm Warner. 1976. Comparative union democracy: organisation and opposition in British and American unions. New York: Wiley.

• this text looks at a large number of British and American unions, attempts to understand oligarchy and democracy through the lens of top-level elections, specifically the closeness of these elections, using statistical modelling 
• its a long, complicated model that describes the variables that are likely to be correlated with un/successful electoral opposition
• doesn't look closely at participation, more interested in finding an theory of organization (and the institutions of an organization)

Garay 2011

in Collier and handlin 2011

Focuses on GROUPS and ASSOCIATIONS, not people/participants

·         Union-linked associations are more likely to coordinate with other associations (262, )

o   Meaning associations linked to unions in Arg and Chile tend to be central in mobilizing associations and creating linkages across them

·         Party association linkages

o   Parties see these associations as possible electoral support (262,)

o   Associations tend to seek issue-based interactions with parties, meaning associations try to get things from parties

§  Arg and chile associatiosn support parties, peru supports candidates, and venzuela is multifaceted

·         Associations tend to not have links with corp unions, more with social movement orgs like CTA, and often (in Peru, Chile, and Arg) with public sectors unions (267)

·         Union connection makes little to no difference on the use of state resources, though union-linked associations are more likely to gain access to state resources (271-272)

·         Popular assocaitions and political parties:

o   Parties seek help during elections (276)

o   Associations have three types of connections, issue-based (one issue), candidate based (connected to candidate) or multifaceted (work with a party in multiple was in multiple arenas) (276-280) countries see a mix of these (278)

o   Overall suggests assocaitions weakness to clientelism MAY be overstated (I don’t buy it)

·         Arg and Chile show some continuity between old and new interest regimes (288)

McGuire 1997

McGuire, James W. 1997. Peronism without Perón: unions, parties, and democracy in Argentina. Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press.

• Chapter 1: Peronism, Party Institutionalization, and Democracy
• "Peronism is a strong collective identity, but weakly institutionalized as a political party. ... Those who have spoken for the Peronist movement, beginning with Juan Perón himself during his 1946-55 presidency, have repeatedly insisted that Peronism is a national movement committed to real democracy, not a political party preoccupied with formal democracy." (1)
• the plebiscitarian leader and the trade unions have always been the core
• "The leaders and members of a national movement, by contrast, think it desirable, and potentially feasible, to establish full ad permanent control of the polity." (4)
• and power can be won in many different ways, electorally or otherwise
• union leaders are not very devoted to the party, meaning they don't have as much at stake for the survival of democracy (5)
• suggestion that the level of party institutionalization is heavily dependent on its origins, and Peróns didn't want or need a strongly institutionalized party (14-15)
• Augusto Vandor tried to create a peronist pary not centered on Perón, but Perón allied with those marginalized by Vandor, and Perón's candidate beat vandor's in the 1966 governor election in Mendoza (18-19)
• this first cycle of routinization ailed, and the specter of Perón's growing power led to military coup (19)
• the second cycle of (attempted) institutionalization came after Luder lost the 1983 election, led by the Renovation wing, Menem had ambiguous but existent ties with the old wing, so the 2nd attempt also failed (19-22)
• this study contends Perón's and Menems unwillingness to institutionalize the party was a big cause PJ never institutionalized (22)
• union leaders were key to both party building movements and the groups that thwarted these movements (26)
• "struggles among Peronist unionists, along with the power-preservation and power-enhancement interests of Peronism's plebiscitarian leaders, have contributed to Peronism's weak party institutionalization.
• Chapter 7, the rise and fall of renovation peronism
• Alfonsin's presidency helped the isntitutionalization of the PJ, for three reasons
• the military had lost legitimacy, so there was a feeling democracy would be around a while (187)
• public opinion seemed to favor adn support political parties (instead of, say corporatism) (187-188)
• Radical Party gained some legitimacy as well, didn't look liek the party that always lost to PJ or always allowed military to take over (188)
• PJs loss in presidential election of 1983 meant the party had to build party from the legislature, not be headed by a super strong prez (188-189)
• leader of the metalworkers had been major power, leader in the party for this election, loss discredited him
• renewal faction of PJ wanted internal elections, less backroom maneuvering (190)
• in the midterm elections the UCR won 43 to 35%, with the renewal faction of the PJ winning by 2-1 margin
• the July 1984 union reform law helped to democratize unions a bit, even if peronists still maintained a lot of control in elections (192)
• with the PJ 62 unions were old school, wanted to control the party, while the "25" ceded leadership of the party to politicians, but also used more leftist talk, opposing hegemony of the US and transnational capital (192-193)
• 13 general strikes against Alfonsin 
• between 1984 and 88 there wre 2721 local strikes (199)
• general strikes may have been an effort on the part of union leaderhsip to contain, channel protests from the base (200)
• neither the 15 (conciliated with Alfonsin) nor the Ubaldinistas (current in CGT) saw the PJ as a useful vehicle for making a mark on politics and society, they wanted to get direct influence on the national executive
• the 15 tried to control the labor ministry
• Ubaldini tried to mobilize unionists with pure economic/societal power to influence the exec (205-6)
• "The "62" liked the tercio because the financial and organizationl weakness of of nonunion Peronism assured them control of nominations in the women's and men's branches of the movement as well as in the union sector." (209)
• Menem did not have the support of hte party but did have the support of the unions (210)
• when Menem won presidential primary in 1988, renovadores lost power in the PJ (211)
• Menem's style reflected Peron's a bit, willing to disregard the rules
• "Above all, Menem defended the notion that Peronism was, first and foremost, a national movement, not a party preoccupied with democracy..." (212)
• for the 15 Menem's victory gave them a chance to get power that their weakness in the CGT and the PJ had long denied them (215)
• left Ubaldini forced to pursue general strike strategy against a peronist, not a great idea
• Chapter 8 free=market reform and political shenanigins
• some peronist leaders opposed Menem's reforms, but most went along with them thansk to the many inducements involved (216), these, of course, meant declines in union membership and deterioration of finances, as well as a new limit on the right to strike
• by 1995 when the growth had slowed, many unions now wanted to oppose menem, but the reforms had already progressed far enough tht there was litlte chance of stopping them (217)
• Menem's rule by decree deinstitutionalized the PJ and, despite runnign fiar elections, did many things that udnermined democratic consolidation
• Menem's economic reforms, content and impact
• Menem's economic reforms were implemented in bad ways, especially privatization which broke most of the UN's "Seven Sins of Privatization", especially the use of discretionary/nontransparent procedures (220)
• currency overvaluation meant wages went down while productivity rose (221)
• main cost was a huge surge in unemployment (223)
• mainly caused by massive layoffs, wage cuts in public sector, capital repalcing waged laborers, and increased import competition (223)
• unions:
• employment dropped in public and private sector, so membership dropped (223-4)
• curtailed right to strike (224)
• collective bargaining was decentralized a bit (by decree, law never quite made it out of congress) (224-5)
• also a decree to reform obras sociales, though labro leaders fought off real reform (226)
• union responses
• union leaders had differing responses to these reforms, from strong opposition to cooperation with tepids of both
• actual responses simply came about because union leaders were very autonomous and just ended up responding differently to conflicting imperatives (protect union versus be loyal to PJ) (226)
• turf battles also played a role (227)
• CGT splits when menemists (allied, oddly enough, with anti-menemists) try to get Ubaldini out of Sec gen position in 1989 (228)
• surprisingly, some of the more combative "25" union leaders became menemists (230)
• when Menem went after the obras sociales, CGT reunited (though with lots of internal conflicts remaining) to fight this (231)
• and the same time the leaders of the state workers ATE and teachers CTERA broke to form the CTA
• CGT called for a General strike in in 1992, but it was weakly attended, and afterwards they adopted a conciliatory tone, whcih didn't win them much (231-232), CTA was combative of all Menem's reforms (232)
• when Menem went after obras sociales in 1993/4 CGT called for a general strike, but called it off after neogtiations were started
• MTA, within CGT, was more combative and untied with CTA for some general strikes and protests against obras changes in 1994 (233)
• CGT acquiesced to Menem because reforms were pretty good, in some instances, for the economy (234-5)
• also menem was head of PJ, adn workers supported the PJ (235)
• hyperinflation had been rough, so fixing it made workers OK with other things (236-237)
• also, privatizations were new opportunities for unions to make money (237)
• suggests decline in normal strike activity was because telephone workers lost a showdown strike (a la PATCO), and economic growth then made future strikes less likely (240-241)
• The Deinstitutionalization of the PJ


• Menem bypassed the party in filling government posts and picking candidates for office, increased isolation of party leadership from government and party members (241)
• internal elections continued, but above meant that party was more deinstitutionalized that insti'ized
• during Alfonsin, everyone had to try and gain power through teh legislaturem, but with Menem everyone could skip legislature adn go straight to the top (241-242)
• Menem imposed lots of extraparty candidates (243)
• "menem thus desintitutionalized the PJ in part by ignoring and then capturing and subordinating a party leadership whose ties to party members, union chiefs, and provincial presidents were in any case tenuous at best." (248)
•  Menem and democratic institutions
• "Some conditions became more propitious for the development of a principles commitment to democracy during Menem's first term in office. Menem presided over six years of electoral activity, proposed or backed legal and constitutional reforms that increased the resilience, fairness, and relevance of certain democratic arenas and procedures, and reduced the level of overt military contestation.
• Against these credits, however, one must weigh Menem's manipulation of electoral rules, bypassing of congress with executive decrees, stacking of the supreme court, tolerance for administrative corruption, lackadaisical respo0nse to physical attacks on journalists critical of the government, and pardons of military officers convicted of human rights violations." (252)
• On the one hand, Menem's policies may grow the national pie, making it easier to settle claims for distribution (260)
• on teh other hand, the party is now less able to actually channel distributive claims, meaning the outcome could still be conflict of distributional issues (261)
• Chapter 9: conclusion
•  weak party institutionalization encouraged union leaders to express their demands through strikes and protests, not the party or elections (262)
• also meant unions weren't devoted to democratic institutions, meaning they didn't necessarily always oppose military dictatorship
• the party became dispensable in union leaders' eyes
• the argument of this book is that, like the rural elites who controlled votes of peasants, the working class leaders could mobilize enough votes to dominate politics, and thus was uninterested in creating strong political democracy (263)
• union power and democratic consolidation are not necessarily at odds, but strong unions can increase distributive conflict and wield a stronger ability to sway political system, meaning democratic consolidation can come down to the level that union leaders want democratic consolidation (266)
• at times union power can have ambiguous results for the poor, who may bear the costs of the creation of a privilege working class
• 1980s union density data (268)
• the strong labor movement from 1955-1983, coupled with weak parties, meant that the labor unions contributed to a strong distributional conflict without any institutional ways to channel it, which created instability (270-271)
• why is it a problem that democracy is not institutionalized? it makes crises and nondemocratic responses to these crises more likely (281)
• 
  

Risley 2011

Risley A. 2011. "The power of persuasion: Issue framing and advocacy in Argentina". Journal of Latin American Studies. 43 (4): 663-691.

·         Analyzing strategies of NGOs that found it necessary and desirable to work with the political class post-2001

o   Two issues: children’s rights and greater transparency in government institutions (664)

o   Non-profit, public interest NGOs and community organizations

·         Argument: by devising effective framing strategies, civil society actors increase their chances of participating in the agenda-setting, formulation, and adoption phases of policy-making

o   Using motivational framing

o   But frames must also incorporate positive of constructive measures

o   In a place where CSOs aren’t normally consulted by the government, activists do not merely respond to existing political opportunities but endeavor to CREATE opportunities for participation (665)

·         It is clear that activists mobilize ideas as well as resources (667)

o   The strategic use of ideas can make up for lack of resources

·         The power of ideas

o   Diagnostic framing: problematizes issue (668)

o   Prognostic framing: suggests solutions

o   Motivational framing: provides rationale for collective action

§  For the last, the motivation must work for both the public AND elites

§  But all three are necessary

o   Policy-friendly frames have THREE MORE characteristics:

§  Contain a positive/constructive message (669)

§  Downplay blame

§  Propose feasible solutions

·         This is only influence over het policy-making process, not over outcomes (671)

·         Two cases:

o   FOI legislation, which CSOs were influential in creating through 2003, but had stalled by 2006 despite continued clamoring by CSOs (672)

o   Child welfare legislation, in which CSOs had only gotten middling levels of policy influence through 2004, but the law went through in 2005 (policy influence ramped up in 2004-2005)

o   Argument: differing levels of involvement was partly the result of different framing

·         FOI

o   Lots of CSOs that had been working on this since the 1990s

o   Did conferences to garner public support and attempted to gain elite support (675)

o   Instead of echoing “que se vayan todos”, they tried to give political elites a chance to do FOI to improve their own image (676)

§  Reforms specifically did not revolve around culpability

o   The legislation as a whole conveyed a sense of hope and institutional building/improving even as much of the rest of the country was angry and disgusted at politics

o   ME: So it seems like these guys did a pretty good job of framing the issue in a way to get everyone on board

·         Advocating for Children

o   CSOs had strong credentials as watchdogs for justice (680)

o   Very successful educating the public on children’s issues (681)

§  Great at motivational framing, but these advocates did not have great diagnostic or prognostic framing (682)

§  Constantly talked about how bad everything was (683)

§  Linked neoliberalism to child poverty

§  Entire system painted as “bad”, bleak (684)

·         Frame of criminalization of poverty emphasized system’s failure

o   Frame suggested only a fundamental change in social and economic model would fix the problem (685)

o   Frame antagonized executive branch and the family courts

§  The extent to which the frame threatens elites has an effect on whether it is implement…child legislation should seem obvious, but frames did not allow elites options for workable solutions (686)

o   BUT all of this changed in 2004-5, when activists latched on to a “modernization” frame, whereby child-poverty legislation was seen as part of modernizing project

·         What changed? Why do we get child legislation and not FOI?

o   Everyone else in the region (not Chile or Mex) had adopted childrens’ rights legislation, Argentina wanted to catch up (687)

§  Took out reproductive rights, which make the legislation more palatable

o   Kirchner did FOI decree for executive branch agencies in 2003, which took off some of the pressure (687)

§  FOI is example that doing everything right does not = policy success (688)

§  But a few years later the momentum picked up again, FOI passed lower house in 2010, stalled in upper house in 2011 (unsure of result due to publishing)

·         Conclusion:

o   Key aspect of CSO advocacy is circulation of people between CSOs and state (689)

Martin 1968

Martin, R. 1968. "Union Democracy: An Explanatory Framework". Sociology. 2 (2): 205-220.

• Studies unions in England
• constraints = thigns that inhibit the union exectuive from destroying internal opposition (205)
• definition of "democracy" = the status of opposition (207)
• democracy exists where organized opposition is tolerated
• it is admitted, however, that faction within a union may harm a union's bargaining position
• 12 constraints on the executive (208)
• political culture (208-209)
• whether internal union culture emphasizes democracy or not
• government attitudes and behavior (209)
• sees effect of whether government wants wage constraint or not, if it wants leaders to discipline members
• membership distribution (209-210)
• the more homogeneous the demands of membership, the more likely democracy will prevail
• strong leaders/bureaucratization arises so that professionals can balance interests of many different groups
• industrial environment (210)
• ownership structures: oncentrated biz deamnds unions to also be pyramids
• employer hostility may increase union solidarity, decrease willingness to allow faction in union
• economic environment
• opposition is OK when economy is good
• technoogy (211)
• for example, work where people have time to chat, are close to one another can build solidarity, opposition groups....divided workers less likely to have time/ability to engage in political discussion
• source of bargaining power
• mass (industrial) power = strong exec
• craft power/local workshop power = weak exec
• membership characteristics
• "political skills" and education, moang other things (211-212)
• Membership beliefs (212)
• about what executive can legitimately do 
• opposition resources and expertise (212-213)
• ability and resources to generate and maintain opposition in a union 
• Leadership Attitudes
• how committed leader is to democracy, etc. (213)
• union structure (213-214)
• does formal structure limit disagreement? allow it to be articulated?
• sub-structural autonomy can help breed democracy
• looks at two cases, from England, RR workers and an engineers union (non-RR, I believe) (214-216)
• 
  
• 
  

Del Bono and Henry 2008

• Introduction
• this article looks at the circumstances that accompanies the development of companies that outsource call center/service jobs to Argentina (8)
• the call centers are unionize but these unions pose little threat to the use of subcontracting by employers
• by refraining from trying to get better conditions for workers, a place becomes more likely to have flexible work relationships, whcih in turn weakens the unions
• argument: the unions contribute, either by action or omission, to the consilidation of the call center sector in Argentina
• and then businesses can threaten to move their operations if workers become strong or if they lose flexibility
• argument: it is the labor/EMPLOYMENT relations that strongly affect the general charactersistics of union action in the call center sector (9)
• looks at two companies, one from US one from France
• unions involved: FAECyS, FOEESITRA, FOETRA in Buenos Aires
• Call centers and services for export in Argentina
•  call center jobs are growing a lot (10)
• since the devaluation, the call center industry has been segmented, with local companies who cal to Argentina and multinationals who call outside Argentina (11-12)
• BA, Cordoba, and Rosario are the big centers for call centers (12)
• call centers looking mostly for cheap labor costs (13)
• Strategies and Responses from unions
• call center businesses leave places with expensive workers and look for places with low cost worekrs with few legal rights
• this challenges unions, as it can be hard to keep employment and make it a decent job
• call centers, tertiarization, and delocalization of work fragment unions and leaders (14)
• responses:
• FAECyS
• the collective agreements that exist leave many workplace issues untouched, including length of day, work conditions, etc (15)
• FAECyS hasn't changed their contract with employers since 1975
• this union was important, even through the 1990s, and negotiated with the government in the 1990s about the conditions of structural change, not oppose them (16)
• call centers hire young workers, and they meet a union that is unwilling to organize and doesn't have a strong enough identity to strengthen their position against employers
• there is NO connection communication between workers in call centers and unions, unions have no presence at work
• BUT unions note that the minute they demand anything, the company can just move somewhere else, like Peru or chile (17)
• contracts are very short term, sometimes use mentoring/internships to get young workers to work (18)
• but this means that there is a lot of turnover, which can be a problem for employers
• businesses think employees move on because the want experience in other businesses, less because there is no career path, no worklife balance, and low wages
• workers are hired to work 30 hours a week, and collective contracts in other telephone work limits work horus to 6 or 7 horus aday, but call center workers usually work more like 8 or 9 in a day, signalling a loss of rights only because the contracts for other telephone work are written too specifically (19)
•  wages also vary a great deal
• THE COLLECTIVE CONTRACT IN THIS CASE acts more as a way for teh business to develop, a "legal cover", rather than true collective representation (20)
• FOETRA
• they seem more willing to demand changes, want tercerization to end (20-21)
• proposed a law that would define telephoe employees as the same as long as they used telephone for three hours a day, this is a way to stop division among different groups of worekrs in telecom (21)
• this would allow FOETRA to expand the good conditions found in other places to call centers and other workplaces that have gotten through with loopholes (22)
• but, of course, this law had little chance of passing
• thsi seems mostly to be an attempt to get the workers who were spun off from ENTEL back into FOETRA (23)
• FOETRA did some strieks, protests, etc against a group called Atento between 2004 and 2006 (24)
• but there was little fixed capital, so the strikes were broken pretty easily, work was moved quickly to other places
• other workers didn't join in with this, as workforce is fragemented (25)
• same story with another company, an internet company, from 2005-2007 (25)
• thus it is becoming increasingly clear that classic, local responses to issue in call centers won't work, and they need much more unity across the sector (26)
• Conclusions
• government may be prolabor now, but unions still dealing with leftover burdens of neoliberalism (26)
• though unions have regained power, they still face a big challenge of the demand by employers for flexible work (27)
• in this case, fleixiblization of work has allowed businesses to push back some labor rights, and unions at the national level haven't been able to effectively push back
• local institutions do affect call centers, and unions have a chance to improve things (just seem to want to end on a high note) (27-28)

Rodríguez 2001

GONZALO M. RODRÍGUEZ. 2001. "Crisis, Social Explosion, and Three Moments of Breaking with Representative Democracy in Argentina". International Journal of Political Economy. 31 (1): 79-88.

• "If in the light of the events it is clear that the will of millions of citizens, expressed through voting, is not respected by their supposed representatives, it is then revealed that representative democracy is not a mechanism of representation, but rather a means of expropriating the popular will." (80)
• the economic consequences of the de la Rua government were the wake-up call of the urban middle sectors (81)
• three breaks with representative democracy
• null votes in October 2001 (82)
• protests in December 2001, supermarket lootings, middle class caceralazos (82-83)
• middle classes and poor rebelled at same time, but they used very different strategies (83)
• asambleas barriales (84)
• big, radical break with representative democracy (85)
• "As Argentine society heads toward an intensification of its social contradictions, the confrontation between the ruling class and the popular sectors (which now include sectors of the comfortable middle class) grows deeper and more visible." (86)
• "Today the people do not have representatives or referents within the "political class"...the people mobilized themselves outside the traditional state structures of the parties, and outside even the unions and other preexisting movements." (86)

Tokman 2007

Tokman, Víctor E. 2007. "The informal economy, insecurity and social cohesion in Latin America". International Labour Review. 146 (1-2): 81-107.

•  Social cohesion comes when a country has achieved economic progress and redistributed the fruits of that growth to the whole of society (81)
• social cohesion helps ensure fairer development and involve all the population in efforts to achieve that growth
• social protection is still limited in LA
• social cohesion provides the causal link between mechanisms of integration and well-being and individuals feeling of belonging to society (82)
• this articles measures this by looking at labor marker participation, social protection and public perception of the effectiveness of instruments about these two issues
• Open markets and their effect
• open markets have meant employment is more closely linked to external demand
• this means the possibilities for increasing wages above productivity or expanding internal demand is limited
• instability is high and particularly affects smaller countries with more open economies, which in turn usually have inadequate instruments to deal with this instability
• informality and precariousness grew. even when poverty retreated, high-income groups shifted some of the adjustment costs to the middle-income groups. Thus, inequality did not diminish and wide income disparities grew (83)
• Employment tenure
• decline in employment tenure and high labor turnover
• but the time spent unemployed tended to be shorter
• but people worried about being unemployed: 75% worried about it, while only 59% of households experienced some unemployment  during the previsous year (citing Latinobarometer from 2005)
• only 18% felt protected by labor legislation
• the informal economy
• insecurity affects the whole population, but it tends to affect the socially excluded even more (84)
• informal sector became the informal economy
• precarious work was mostly concentrated in the informal sector, but was increasingly seen in formal-sector enterprises (85)
• only Chile, Argentina, Brazil and El Salvador have seen a decrease in informal-sector activities in the past 15 years (no citation for this, seems to get it from ECLAC) (86)
• the larger the informal sector, the larger public perception of insecurity...more unequal countries also have a larger informal sector (87)
• labor market participation determines eligibility for social security which determines cohesion, and obviously informal sector workers don't participate in labor market (89)
• Strategies favoring social cohesion
• workers in informal sector are often workers and entrepreneurs (92)
• they are socially excluded by low incomes, lack of social protections, and employment isntability
• they are integrated into the labor market but on a precarious basis
• need to extend social protections in order to make people feel like they belong (92-93)
• entry into the formal sector opens the door to social and economic citizenship which, in turn, is a prerequisite for belonging and integration (93)
• issues of micro-enterprises being able to absorb the costs associated with formal employment (95)
• perhaps create a dual system, one for small biz and one for big ones
• "fundamental rights are inalienable even if the necessary compliance involves some job losses" (96)
• Three strategies to address social tension (105)
• incorporate the informal sector into the modern sector
• fix problems with "disguised" employment and/or emloyment not initially included under labor legislation (105-106)
• do flexicurity (106)

my take: this dude is from Europe, and wants the rest of the world to look like Europe

Senén González and Borroni 2011

• Introduction
• this article questions the extent to qhich context creaqtes social dialogue, versus strategic action of the actors involved, or if it's a combination of these variables (34)
• Strategic Focus
• looking at the role external circumstances play and what actors do to understand how revialization is happening (35)
• the context changed greatly between teh 90s adn the 00s (36), and much of that change was caused by change in politics (37)
• in general, actors respond to these new circumstances in different ways, meaning that external circumstances do not force change, there is some strategic choice involved (37-38)
• what happens is a combination of context, institutions, historical paths, and strategic options available (38)
• some history of social dialogue
• 1994 CGT and employers made an agreement that focused mainly on employment and labor reform, but most of these points were not put into practice (41)
• 1997 there was an attempt to dialogue over flexbilization, but it totally failed
• 2001: social dialogue about how to ameliorate, end the crisis, resulted in Jefes y Jefas de Hogar and other things (42)
• after 2003 the government recuperated its role as a labor regulator, respecting labor institutions, and pushing for social dialogue
•  El Consejo Nacional del Empleo, la Productividad, y el Salario Minimo, vital, y Movil
• the minimujm wage council is the best example of new social dialogue (43)
• it aims to increase formal employment and improve inequality
• includes both the CGT and the CTA
• also, collective bargaining
• (44-47) numbers of colective agreements, same as the Senén Gonzlez, Medwid, Trajtemberg (2011) article
• labor conflict
•  way more strikes after 2003 (47)
• in 1990s and early 00s, labor wasn't strong enough bu saw piqeuteros and other actions as an outgrwoth of labor union weakness/inability to strike
• 2006 strikes = 770, 2010 strikes = 940, growth each year (see data page 48)
• though proportionally most strikes are in public sector, number of people and days lost in private sector grew a lot, while public sector was fairly consistent 2006-2010 (49)
• Conclusion
• suggest that social dialogue is increasing, point to collective bargaining and minimum wage council (50)
• experience in Argentina shows that revitalization doesn't necessarily have to look like what people say in Global North
• actors made the difference in this case, as social dialogue mechanisms existed in teh 1990s, they were just ignored, started to be used when K's decided to use them (51)
• Argentina is still looking for a grand Social Pact, but I think this is just playing games with teh Global North/Germany literature

Senén Gonzlez, Medwid, Trajtemberg 2011

• Introduction
• Bargaining has become more centralized since the decentralization of the 1990s (155)
• describes three levels: local, sector, and national (with government)
• looking at two time periods, 1990-2002 and 2003-2010 (156)
• checking three types of determinants: economic, legal institutions, and political ideologies that help determine where bargaining will happen
• THESIS: 90s dectralized but in 00s became "cnetralizacion intermedia"
• Determinants in the lit
• economic
• opening to global trade (labor cotsts become important) ( 156-157)
•  geographic dispersement of industries plays a role (157)
• structure of employment plays a role (157-158)
• legal institutions (158-159)
• political/ideological (159-160)
• Structure of Collective bargaining
• collective agreements went WAY up after 2002 (161)
• before 2002, average per year was 177, most was 219.
• after 2002 LEAST was 348 and most, in 2010, 2038
• careful when citing this data, words dont' match grafic
• coverage went from 1 mil in 2004 to 4 mil in 2009
• this contrast with 1990s, when high unemployment led to lots of off-the-books workers (161-162)
• coverage in was roughly 84.5% in 2008
• in 1991 negotiations between union adn employer were only 19% of contracts, all the rest were sector-level (163)
• by 1998 this had risen to 80%
• after 2003 a jump to sector-level being about 30% of contracts, hovered there through 2010 (163-164)
• between 2004 and 2008, sector negotiations rose by 291%, but decentralized, enterprise level also rose 236% (164)
• sector-level contracts are important, because they set the minimum wage levels and day length
• Content of Contracts and salary
• in teh 1990s, all contracts tended to focus on felixbilization
• entre 2003 and 2010, bigger deal was pay issues
• almost all included pay increases, but many of these were thanks to increase in legal minimum wage
• also, government stepped in to get employers and unions at the table to try and iron out issues before neogitiations (165)
• data on salary increases (165)
• salaries paid began to match those in sector agreements, meaning local employers had less flexibility in what they paid workers (165)
• this means that workers pay is being determined on a collective basis, not and individual basis (166)
• Legal Institutions
• state has two major interventions:
• personaria gremial: uniosn have the right to bargain (167)
• inscripcion gremial: union exists, can represent its workers, but only its workers, and cannot take precedent over a union with personaria gremial
• approving collective contracts
• these are very strong (168)
• unions
• generally pyramidal and vertical
• have a double game: national level/political and local level through comisiones internas o delegados
•  three levels: local, federation (sector, state), national (CGT)
• 1st two levels do all the bargaining
• CGT at third level is a political entity, doesn't do any direct bargaining for wages
• changes in the 1990s
• all three things changed, laws, economics, and political ideologies (169)
• each of these led to decentralization of bargaining, sometimes down to individual level (168-172)
• but since 2003 all three things have changed to slow the decentralization
• laws
• Néstor increased freedom of unions to strike, though he did keep the government's right to regulate strikes of "servicios esenciales" (173)
• but the new law included that strikers could not be replaced or face retribution from employers
• economic
• debt default and growing economy in the 00s
• ...and all of this came because Kirchner had a new political ideology
• and his drive to create alliances with unions (174)
• conclusions
• in Argentina the law is the major variable in explaining the differences between the 1990s and 2000s, but the other determinants also played a role (174)
• personaria gremial helps prevent fragmentation of the labor movement (175)
• now the government is acting like a coordinador of the disparate demands of workers and employers

Stokes 2006

Do Informal Rules Make Democracy Work? Accounting for Accountability in Argentina" Susan C. Stokes 125-139

in editors Helmke, Gretchen, and Steven Levitsky 2006. Informal institutions and democracy: lessons from Latin America. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

• likens some informal rules of democracy to language rules, where we learn to follow them before we learn what they actually are  (125)
• two central premises of the chapter:
• the way people vote in elections is rule-governed, and individuals rules for making voting decisions should be taken seriously (126)
• voters decision rules are grammatical: they are known and diffused through social mechanisms and rarely discussed openly, but are still not violated
• informal institutions and rules do not just describe what people do, but also what the expect other people to do (128)
• In Argentina, author suggests, democratic institutions are weak (128-129)
• Argentine democracy actually functions better in places where informal rules enforce accountability (129)
• people in places where democracy works pretty well display a heightened appreciation for mechanism of accountability AND expect others to follow decision-rules that make accountability possible (mar del Plata)
• in clientelisitic areas, people expect others to vote in ways that support clientelism (BA, Córdoba, Misiones)
• uses survey evidence
• "Expectations of accountability, when they do occur in Argentina, focus both on formal institutions and on informal rules and behaviors." (131, emphasis added)
• in places where democracy works, voters vote on whether a politician was accountable and expect others to do the same (132)
• none of this comes from any inherent belief (in Mar del Plata) that people are more trustworthy (135) or because they think perpetrators will be caught (136) but because they think people will lose support, voters, whatever if they aren't accountable (136-137)
• Authors hunch: beliefs in accountability are both a cause and a consequence of well-functioning democracy (138-139)
• 
  

Helmke and Levitsky 2006

 Introduction, Helmke and Levitsky, 1-30

editors Helmke, Gretchen, and Steven Levitsky 2006. Informal institutions and democracy: lessons from Latin America. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

• lots of literature, the "unrule of law" scholars, question the extent to which focus on "parchment" rules of law actually misses important on-the ground realities (1)
• "informal rules shape how democratic institutions work" (2)
• some informal rules compete with and subverts democracy (dedazo in Mexico), others can complement and help sustain them (Chilean Concertacion) (3)
• informal institutions definition: socially shared rules, usually unwritten, that are created, communicated, and enforced outside officially sanctioned channels (5)
• they must be enfored in some fashion (5)
• four distinctions: informal institutions should be distinguished from (6)
• weak institutions
• other informal behavioral irregularities: a patterned behavior must be accompanied by a rule and social sanction (if not done) for it to be an informal institution
• informal organizations (7): separate rules from players
• culture. these are not culture, though it can at times be hard to tell them apart
• why informal rules matter: (8) (can be good and/or bad)
• Political representation can be affected in both directions
• programmatic links can be broken
• sometimes looks like the tradeoff in clientelism
• democratic accountability (9):
• vertical accountability (citizens can punish officials), and
• horizontal (officials are responsible to other agencies, officials)
• informal rules can provide more accountability, but it might not provide the right type of public accountability (10-11)
• democratic governance
• informal rules of accommodation, power-sharing, and coalition building can prevent intractability problems (11)
• at times these may improve governance and stability, but not democracy
• citizenship and the rule of law
• brown areas = places where citizens do not actually possess the rights they should, especially indigenous (12)
• informal institutions can both violate and advance citizenship rights in areas not fully controlled by the state
• typology (13)
• two dimensions:
• degree of convergence between informal and formal institutions
• effectiveness of relevant formal institutions
• page 14:

	Effective formal institutions	Ineffective formal institutions
Convergent	Complementary	Substitutive
Divergent	Accommodating	Competing

• some final points on this typology
• Substitutive may be able to achieve things that formal rule fail to (17)
• same informal rules may be in different box depending on the formal institutions discussed
• the relationship between formal/informal institutions is dynamic, both can cause decay and/or institutionalization of the other, can cause stability or instability in formal rules

Palomino 2005

• Introduction:
• social movements existed before 2001, came from the social de-structuring brought on by neoliberalism, not by the crisis of 2001 (20)
• The construction of the social ties of the movements
• the context
• the 1990s saw increased precarity in teh popular classes, but also reached up to the middle classes, who became the "new poor" (20)
• early demands of teh movements were about necessities of subsistence
• the barter clubs and big flea markets in the BA acted as a way to link the middle and lower classes, as everyone shopped there (21)
• origins of the movements also came from the erosion of social integration policies, like retirement, current retirees were "sacrificied" to create new privatized systems
• many of the movements were attempts for the disconnected members of society to make social and labor demands
• but they did so as they also experimented with new ways of organizing themselves! (21-22)
• the cycles of protest and the crisis of the neoliberal model
•  first rounds of protest, in the interior mostly, against the negative outcomes of adjustment (22)
• second round of protest comes in when the promises of the adjustment aren't borne out
• often attached to previous human rights movements
• but included piquteros and workers who were recupterating closed businesses
• crisis was a big third cycle, with asambleas barriales joining other movements
• also, the breakdown of national political institutions allowed for new forms of political represenation, like direct democracy in neighbrohood assemblies (23)
• the movements created conditions for the development of new forms of social integration
• CTA very involved in this, became an umbrella group as they welcomed in groups of informal workers, unemployed, and social movements
• the implementation or new values
• one common charatersistic of the new movements in their focus on organizational form and governance, as well as organizational norms (23)
• their openness was a response to tradiational movements, that often ended up as clientelistic groups (24)
• list of autonomy goals, including from the state, from hierarchy, etc.
• but there were differences, too
• piqueteros relied on the state to privde for them, even as they protested the state
• piqueteros had minor demands (subsistence) but did major actions (blocked roads)
• asambleas barriales had major demands (reform democracy) but did minor actions (local soup kitchens, job posting in neighborhoods, etc)
• the workers in recuperated plants, despite being a small minority, showed that they could have a major affect on the discussion of work at the national level (25)
•  new identities are being created, not just revitalizing old ones
• it is possible that these movements' future depends on changing the whole of society, but it is also not necessary to think that these movements need to make obvious change, but could think of changing the minds of the people rather than gaining political power
• Autogestion and social economy
• two parts of autogestión: (26)
• a dimension of public ownership but not state-ownership
• solidarity and reciprocity, not a market relationship, as the basis of work
• an attempt to fix the situations which liberal economics cannot fix, like the high open unemployment
• authors admit is it a bit utopian, but for those facing unemployment it seems like it could work, and certianly work better than waiting on a state/economy that can't provide for them (27)
• The movement of workers in recuperated businesses
• Intro:
• started by workers with little other option for work (28)
• challenges private property rights and traditional division between capitalist and worker
• these actually started in the late 1990s, but this looks at 2002 and after
• Diversity of the movement
• most of the closings preceded by breaking contracts, lowering wages, etc (29)
• not all workers want to be part of the movement, but they all want the recuperated factory to stay open (31)
• but there is usually a nucleus that seeks out, forms connections with other factories, movements, and the neighborhood
• after December 2001 recuperadas got the help of piqueteros and asambleas barriales (32)
• at first unions had varied responses, some helped, some were passive, some sided with employers (32)
• but eventually as the movement grew, all the big unions at least started talking about adding these groups to their organizations
• employer groups have (to 2005) been pretty silent about these things (33)
• but the threat of recuperating a business that might close has been a bargaining tool for workers
• the universe of recuperated businesses
• some have been recuperated, some are headed there, and others have been fighting to recuperate (34)
• legally workers in a cooperative are redefined and need to remake ties with union, even if union is involved in recuperation of a business
• about 98 (see page 34-35 for some numbers, breakdown of biz)
• these are esepcially powerful because they make the strike weapon stronger, in that bankruptcy is not necessarily a bad thing for the workers, so the company can't threaten it (36)
• The conflicts that precede recuperation
• three phases: conflict between workers and management, takeover, and either reopening or ensuring continuation of business (37)
• first thing to usually go is payment of salaries
• call of creditors to close the business tends to radicalize workers
• before  takeover, demands in labor courts are about back wages, after demands are more genreally about the owners ability to run the firm (38)
• sometimes workers are able to generalize their demands, get help from lots of different (other0 social movements (39)
• "lucha, resistencia, solidaridad" is the motto
•  The role of unions
• individual supporters came out with these recuperated enterprises... (40)
• but only one union immediately offered institutional support (the cnfiteros, pasteleros, pizzeros, alfajoreros, y afines)
• most swung between ambiguity and abandoning these locals
• two studies cases:
• in Rosario a union struggled against the closing of a supermarket, helped create a community market in its place
• UOM was against one at IMPA, but some dissidents helped make it happen (40-41)
• but some uniosn abandoned their locals, and we see traditional uniosn relying on old tactics when faced with something news (41)
• but without unions workers find themselves with only weak and fragile access to social services, as thse services are often teh basis of their union identity (42)
• Some legal aspects
• 42-44
• How it all works
• to get supplies, workers suggest old owner defaulted, but they won't, or seeks solidarity loans from other groups (44)
• the key is whether their clients stick around or not (44-45)
• sometimes other groups, movements, or parties help supply startup funding (45)
• usually these businesses end up running below their total possible production, do just in time of day-order work, because they can't find workers, workers work slower, or can't find clients for their products
• most of the money is spent mostly trying to keep production going, meaning wages tend to be at a subsistence level, meaning its hard to find new workers (46)
• workers are paid using what the company has made, and usually only weekly, meaning workers sometimes have to carry debt from week to week
• skilled workers are not paid more (47)
• workers try lots of new forms of organization, often very democratic ones see page 48-49
• New identities
• still tend to define themselves as workers (49)
• but at the same time, there is also a belief that there is something different, that new employees need a "education" on cooperatives and that they should be connected to larger society as well (50)
• paternal practices of old boss are replaced by a "family relation" among cooperative workers
• these are examples of CREATED collective identity, both between workers and between businesses and community (51)

Lopreite 2014

not yet published, politics of reproductive rights

• Introduction
• variation in domestic policy re: reproductive rights in Arg, Mex (1)
• both are federal countries with subnational mobilization on these issues
• looks at role of women legislators and political parties in understanding success of gender legislation (2)
• separates contraception and abortion, as they engender different responses (3)
• Explaining Legislative outcomes
• would expect:
• number of women in legislature to increase bills on women's issues
•  party ideology and fragmentation will also come into play: strong ideology drives legislators, fragmentation suggests parties will be less liekly to take a stand on the issue (4)
• National level politics in favor of women's reproductive rights was bleak with Menem, Fox (4-5)
• In Mexico, PRD control of DF meant that DF allowed contraception and abortion (6)
• this resulted in conservative backlash in other parts of the country
• ability of states to create own penal code allowed for political opportunities in both directions (7)
• Starting with Duhalde, women legislators in Argentina able to get federal government ot OK contraception rights (8)
• Women in Congress and Preferences toward Reproductive Rights
• Lots of Women in Arg parliament (9)
• Mexico doesn't follow quotas well (11)
• Political parties fragmentation in Argentina means parties don't take strong stand, women able to form cross-party coalitions (11-12)
• Conclusions:
• number of women in legislature was not a determining factor for policy success (13)
• party ideology was key
•