Samstad 2002

Samstad 2002

Samstad, James G. 2002. "Corporatism and Democratic Transition: State and Labor during the Salinas and Zedillo Administrations". Latin American Politics and Society. 44 (4): 1-28.
Overview:

• Corporatism involved three levels
  
  • State/”Macro”-corporatism: national level, tripartite discussions of economic and political policy (3)
    
  • Micro/Local or firm level corporatism: representatives on JCA’s
    
  • Party corporatism
    
• Shift to export-led growth created tensions in the coalition forged under ISI (5)
  
• Procedural democracy poses a greater challenge to corporatism that ELG (6)
  
  • Decline of strong president gives each level of corp. more autonomy
    
  • Resistance to herding rank and file by authoritarian labor leaders
    
• By end of Salinas, labor corp. still basically intact (11)
  
• Creation of UNT in 1997, labor split challenged all three levels of corporatism
  
  • who gets to peak bargain? (MACRO)
    
    • CTM tries ‘corporatism without government’
      
  • UNT and some in CT call for more democratic PRI(PARTY)
    
    • ALSO: primaries for candidates decreases labor delegates
      
• Few structural changes to corporatism, HOWEEVER, big changes in how corporatism works in practice
  

Quotes:
“The party (PRI) has formally incorporated labor as a ‘sector’ with nominal voting rights…Over the years, representatives of PRI-affiliated labor organizations consequently secured a non-insignificant share of nominations for elected posts…In return, those organizations were often expected to deliver the votes and organizational support of their rank and file…” (4)
“The shift to export-led growth created tensions in the coalition forged under ISI” (5)
“What change that has occurred has been in how corporatism functioned in practice, and this transformation has come primarily as a side-effect of a decline in centralized presidentialism and an increase in political pluralism during [Zedillo’s] sexennio.” (19)

Fairris and Levine 2004

Fairris and Levine 2004

Fairris, D., and E. Levine. 2004. "Declining union density in Mexico, 1984-2000". MONTHLY LABOR REVIEW. 127 (9): 10-17.
Overview:
Data on Declining Union Density in Mexico, drop of 10 percentage points from 1984-2000
Uses old data from 1980s combined with household surveys
Education workers HIGHLY unionized, well higher than any other industry (13-14)
Finds changing composition of workforce is part of the decline (areas of low unionization, gender, etc etc.), but much of the decline is changing institutional context (Unfavorable government, employers)
Quotes:
“For the "formal" sector labor force as a whole, union density declined from just over 30 percent in 1984 to just under 20 percent in 2000.” (11)

De la Garza Toledo 2003

De la Garza Toledo 2003

De La Garza Toledo, E. 2003. "MEXICAN TRADE UNIONISM IN THE FACE OF POLITICAL TRANSITION". Research in the Sociology of Work. (11): 207-228.

from cornfield and McCammon 2003

Overview

• Two factors causing crisis of corporatism
  
  • Neoliberal turn
    
  • Restructuring of large firms and production processes
    
    • Has resulted in flexible and/or unilateral collective bargaining model
      
• Tried neoliberal corporatism, failed
  
• New working class in Mexico has lost its ideology and project, new working class (maquila sector) have no class identity, no trade union tradition
  
• The state, unions, and firms prefer ghost unions to no unions
  
• Little has changed
  
• UNT not being overly confrontational
  
• Predicts unlikely that Fox will wage war against corporatism (he’s right!)
• NEW TAKE
• the "neoliberal corporatist" attempts during the early 1990s totally failed to change unions (210)
• this also failed because the state partially withdrew from labor relations leaving firms to carry out their own restructuring (211)
• AGAIN STATE IS A PASSIVE PLAYER
• 
  

Quotes:
“The unions appeared in the nineties as mere control instruments sustained by a formal and informal political, judiciary, and institutional superstructure constructed over workers since the thirties”

“It would seem these leaders are more interested in survival or in gaining power that in taking advantage of the situation in order to reorient trade unionism toward non-corporate, democratic and representative paths”

Cook 2007

Cook, Maria Lorena. 2006. The politics of labor reform in Latin America: between flexibility and rights. University Park, Pa: The Pennsylvania State University Press.

Chapter 5: Bolivia and Mexico (only Mexico here)

• Technical, ambiguous nature of the law allows the JCAs a lot of discretionary power
• also makes protection contracts easier to attain
• exclusion and separation clauses
• make protection unions stronger
• protect leadership in unions from rank-and-file revolt
• 1980s: “The economic crisis weakened all labor unions, but independent unions were hit hardest by industrial restructuring and never regained a presence in manufacturing” (163)
• Government devoted to neoliberal model
• in 1990s-2000s, “corporatist compromise” granted increased flexibility to employer in exchange for conserving the status quo on unions’ organizational prerogatives and collective rights
• First round of labor reform proposals in late 1990s, both for PRD and PAN, tried to take apart corporatist system, demand greater union democracy
• labor divided:
• official wanted to keep positions
• UNT unions divided, because some (SNTE, STRM?) didn’t want to totally demolish system
• also fear that once the bill hit Congress, everything would change!
• Fox appoints a businessman, Carlos Abascal, to head Labor Ministry
• His reform (which fails) would create greater flexibility and not touch internal democracy of unions
• Sequence of transition, economic then democratic, may have limited possiblities for democratic labor reform
• business now heading the labor ministry!!
• official unions can give wage restraint, which managers want, so managers allow official unions to survive
• “As long as the PRI remains a significant presence in Mexican politics, labor’s relationship with the party is likely to continue and the party is likely to degfnd the demands of the traditional labor sector” (192)
• see labor reform failure in 2012!
• MEXICO NOT ABLE TO REALIZE PROMISE OF PROGRESSIVE LABOR LAWS OF DEMOCRATIC TRANSITION

Cook 2002

Cook, María Lorena. 2002. "Labor Reform and Dual Transitions in Brazil and the Southern Cone". Latin American Politics and Society. 44 (1): 1-34.

• During democratic transitions governments are under pressure to restore civil and political rights, unions can make gains
• During economic transitions, unions face a variety of constraints, focus on survival
• Order of transition effects process and outcome of labor law reform
• In Brazil and Argentina, democracy then neoliberalism
• democracy led to greater, pro-labor reforms for unions
• later consolidation of neoliberal tried to roll back some of these labor protects
• In Chile, neoliberalism then democracy
• neoliberalism (and dictatorship) severely weakened labor movement
• later democratic transition brought some civil protections, but entrenched economic interests resisted strong labor protections
• Democratic Transitions
• both Argentina and Brazil inherit democratization and economic crisis
• Argentina
• First democratic government did not want to empower Peronist unions
• but business interests divide, labor not that divided, able to win demands
• Brazil
• CUT was oppositional to government, worked through the PT
• business divided here as well
• though able to beat some proposals, watered down others
• in the end, new Constitution was a bit of a labor relations hybrid
• WHEN DEMOCRACY FIRST, LABOR CAN BE MORE MILITANT
• Economic Transitions
• Argentina
• Menem had support of labor in the election
• first term:
• labor divided, some support Menem (in exchange for some concessions in law), others more combative
• CGT could not strongly resist flexibilization, but able to strongly resist losing obras sociales
• CGT focused on saving organizational resources, waited to fight another day!
• second term
• Menem threatens organization resources!
• unions mobilize
• favorable climate, because lots of popular discontent
• LABOR ABLE TO RESIST REFORMS THAT THREATENED IT’S RESOURCES, BUT NOT LIMIT NEOLIBERAL TURN
• Brazil
• Collor then Cardoso both beat Lula, no labor backing for them!
• political climate not favorable for unions
• labor divided, Forca Sindical willing to accept flexibility
• similarly to Argentina, labor has a lot of losses but is able to maintain significant resource reservoirs
• CHILE
• Story above
• Pinochet decimated unions
• employers unified
• even though labor had legitimacy going into democratic transition, too weak to do much
• political allies of labor accepts neoliberal model

Cook 1996

Cook, María Lorena. 1996. “National Labor Strategies in Changing Environments: Perspectives from Mexico”, in eds. Lourdes Benería and Mary Jo Dudley. Economic restructuring in the Americas. Ithaca, N.Y.: Latin American Studies Program, Cornell University.

• Which factors proved most important in shaping union responses to economic restructuring?
• political-economic environment
• statist government/economy leads to political tactics by unions
• shift to market economies undermines these tactics
• corporate ordering
• shift to market may undermine regime itself
• Organizations and structure of unions
• organization structure
• centralization of movement
• fragmentation or concentration (??)
• internal democracy or not
• sectoral/industry location, affects:
• bargaining strength
• target (government or private industry)
• Political Factors
• parties and political currents
• unions relationship with state
• union leaders’ ideology
• Changing environments and trade union strategies
• 1950-70s, Stabilizing Development
• high centralization under CTM
• CTM had close relationship with the PRI
• all important labor dissident movements had been defeated
• Goodies!
• wage increases, benefits, and direct subsidies to labor organizations
• leaders getting political offices
• labor is a joint partner in achieving ideals of Revolution
• Leftover ideology from Mexican Revolution and ISI makes this all possible
• Labor Insurgency, 1970-76
• Recessions, peso devaluation in 1976
• Political opening, due to loss of legitimacy after ‘68
• Independent unions allowed to register
• Early labor insurgency struggles mostly about internal union democracy
• autoworkers (UOI), SME, Mineros, lots of others
• New Strategies
• autonomy and economism
• no political entanglements
• focus on wages
• automobile workers, sections of the mineros and metalworkers, THE UOI, STRM,
• but hard for these unions to stay totally apolitical
• Democratic Revolutionary-Nationalism
• ideals of revolution:
• strong state intervention in the economy
• nationalization of important industries
• strong protections for labor, popular class
• some saw this as reaffirming corporatist
• more radical group saw corporate system too complacent
• SME, railroads, mining
• Fragmentation of labor led to
• Some CTM, CT unions head disaffiliate when see CTM weakenss
• CTM radicalizing its demands, strikes more
• Echeverria had been playing independent and official off each other, but returns to help official when private sector unhappy with economy
• no more independent unions registered after 1974
• Portillo (1976-82)
• demands wage restraint, has to lean on unions to get it
• when economy turns up again in 1978, CTM and CT head to Congress to make gains
• but did so by building alliances with independent unions
• New dissident groups emerge
• CNTE
• autonomist strategy, no politics!
• 1980s, economic crisis and narrowing of strategic options
• militance will not be tolerated
• (Independent) SUTIN workers lose jobs after parastatal closed in response to strike (199)
• PRi turns away from official unions, so official unions turn towards independent unions
• supports SME
• supports STRM when government occupies their buildings
• official unions moderation did not gain it as much power as they used to
• economic crisis hit all labor, but independent unions lost a lot more
• auto and steel unions “economicist” strategy fails
• labor just can’t win!
• 1990s, economic opening and political crisis
• neoliberal model deepened, labor loses some more: ECONOMIC STRATEGY UTTERLY FAILS
• political strategy also losing steam
• FESEBES founded, challenges CTM dominance
• CROC in 1980s was just a weaker CTM, FESEBES decentralized, better fit for new economic model
• CTM could only try to limit erosion of its powers, few strategies working for anybody
• Strategies NOW:
• CTM sticking to political strategy
• Employers demanding more flexible unions, willing to work on productivity
• CTM not doing that!
• FESEBES kind of doing that
• Transnational arena, through NAFTA/NAALC
• Conclusion
• 1970s: political strategy, fails later
• increased fragmentation of labor movement with FESEBES
• less militancy
• greater strain on internal democracy
• in this period SME and STRM actually move closer to PRI, through FESEBES!
•