Open World Conference of Workers
In Defense of Trade Union Independence & Democratic Rights
WHC Report Section 1
Dear
Brothers and Sisters:
Following
is Part 1 of the report-back on the Western Hemisphere Workers'
Conference, which was held Novvember 14-16, 1997, at the Ramada Plaza
Hotel in San Francisco.
Section
1 contains the following:
· Cover letter from Conference Planning Committee
· Final Declaration adopted unanimously by the conference
· List of all 412 registered conference participants
·
Article
about the conference reprinted from the San
Francisco Bay Guardian
TO ALL TRADE UNIONISTS AND SUPPORTERS OF LABOR RIGHTS:
Jack Henning (Secretary-Treasurer Emeritus, California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO)
Dear Brother and Sisters,
the list of 412 registered conference participants from 20 different countries
the list of unions and organizations that sent greetings
excerpts from many of the main speeches
full list resolutions and statements adopted by the workshops
articles on the conference from various publications.
During the conference, the participants openly presented their diverse points of view. The debate and discussion was open, wideranging, respectful. Most important, the delegates understood that whatever differences we may have, the primary purpose of the gathering was to find common ground for common action -- and this was accomplished.
The Final Conference Declaration, unanimously adopted by the delegates during the Sunday morning session, solidified our commitment to mobilizing throughout the hemisphere around a common day of action. The Declaration calls for demonstrating against NAFTA-like trade agreements and NAFTA expansion in mid-April 1998, when government representatives and members of the financial elite will meet in Chile to advance their agenda of creating a Free Trade Area of the Americas. (The specific date of the action will be decided by the end of the year.)
We call on the entire labor movement -- and on all supporters of labor and human rights -- to join the conference delegates and endorsing unions and organizations in building this Continental Day of Action around the four final demands of the conference declaration: No to NAFTA! - No to FTAA! - No to MAI - Stop Privatizations and Deregulation!
The Conference voted to constitute a Continuations Committee that will function out of the San Francisco Labor Council. It is open to all who wish to advance the conference objectives. The Committee does not seek to substitute itself for the various unions, federations, international union bodies and organizations that have taken up the fight against globalization. Its sole aim is to promote unity in action to build global unionism.
Organizing such a unified show of force in less than four months is an immense task. Emphasis must be placed on building citywide coalitions at the local level. These should involve the trade unions as well as the environmental and community organizations. Though the effort may seem daunting, we are certain we will know how to meet the challenge.
As Jack Henning so aptly put it, "This conference must not be a one-shot deal, a passing phase. This body must become a continuing structure. If properly pursued, this could be a lasting day in the history of the labor movement. But it will be no more than a forgotten footnote in history if there is no pursuit of the purpose of this assembly."
We hope you will use as much of this information as possible for reproduction in the newspapers and newsletters of your unions and organizations. We can also send you these documents -- as well as a full array of scanned photographs -- electronically by email. Just send us your email address.
Our goal is to put together the full conference proceedings as soon as possible. This would include the plenary speeches, workshop reports, position papers and background documents submitted by the participating unions and organizations, as well as the full list of greetings and letters of endorsement. We feel we have a magnificent book here, an invaluable tool to arm us in the difficult struggle against globalization.
But here's the hitch: We are in dire need of additional resources to do this. We still have an important debt remaining from the conference expenses. We will need your continued financial support -- large or small -- to help us pay back the many individuals who loaned us money to make this event possible.
And we will also need funds to publish the full conference proceedings -- not to mention help coordinate the April 1998 actions by means of a newsletter that will report on the organizing efforts in cities across the hemisphere. We urgently need you to give what you can to help. We are counting on your financial support to ensure that this conference does not become a simple footnote in history, as Brother Henning insisted.
Commemorative posters are still available and will be sent to all those who contribute $15 or more. Bulk prices are available on request.
Please stay involved, committed and full of hope. We call on you to come on board the Continuations Committee, helping us to build the continuing structure that can push back global capitalism as we build global unionism.
In Solidarity,
The Conference Planning Committee
WESTERN
HEMISPHERE CONFERENCE
AGAINST
NAFTA AND PRIVATIZATIONS
NOVEMBER
16, 1997
To workers, organized and unorganized, to the organizations of the working class, and to the peoples of the Americas and the world, we address this declaration.
We are leaders and activists in trade unions and other worker organizations from throughout the Western hemisphere. Together, our organizations represent tens of millions of working people. We have gathered in San Francisco, California (United States), on November 14, 15, and 16, to give testimony to the deleterious effects the transnational corporate agenda has had on working people throughout the hemisphere and to improve our capacity for mutual support and solidarity in our responses to this assault upon living and working conditions and democratic rights.
To our sisters and brothers in the labor movement of the United States, we extend our congratulations and heartfelt appreciation for their successful effort in turning back the Clinton Administration's most recent attempt to restore "fast-track" trade agreement negotiation authority, and to extend NAFTA from Tierra del Fuego to the Arctic Circle in the form of the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA).
Together, we have heard the reports of delegations from throughout the hemisphere, telling of the miserable consequences of NAFTA, Mercosur, and the other free trade agreements which have been forced upon the people of the Americas by the transnational corporations, aided and abetted by the governments and international financial institutions in their service. We have listened to the testimony of unionists and activists from countries throughout the Americas, who have told how capital's global agenda has wreaked havoc through deregulation, privatization, and destruction of public services, degradation of the environment, attacks on collective bargaining, working conditions, and labor codes, and a frontal assault on the right of working people to be represented by trade unions independent of governments and the employers. We have explored the ramifications of the pending Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI).
In mounting this assault, multinational capital seeks to undermine not only the capacity of workers to defend themselves, but also the democratic rights of our peoples and the very sovereignty of the laws and institutions established over decades of struggle. In the name of "free trade," our freedoms and rights are being systematically subverted.
What is the balance sheet of these free trade agreements and the concomitant privatization and deregulation forced upon the countries of the hemisphere by the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund through its structural adjustment plans, and by the United States itself? The details are many; together, they paint a picture of growing misery and increasing social and economic inequality for the mass of working people, peasants, and the poor of our countries.
From each country represented at our conference, we heard examples.
In Canada, the universal healthcare system is being destroyed in an attempt to impose privatization. Production is being moved to lower-wage countries, as in the case of the Bauer Skate Company in Ontario--bought by the multinational Nike Corp., operated in Canada for six months, and then moved to Malaysia, along with 500 factory jobs.
In Chile, a wholesale destruction of the public sector has been underway for some time. Already, the Chilean people have had their pension system robbed by capital, and the average workweek in the country has become one of the longest in the hemisphere, extending to weekends and holidays.
In Brazil, the drive to reduce labor costs--which, the bosses, insist, is the only way to make the country competitive in the global market--pits worker against worker and union against union. When Mercedes-Benz sought to enlarge its operations in the city of Campinas, the company demanded a no-strike pledge from the union. Faced with the union's refusal to accept this blackmail, Mercedes-Benz relocated its factory to another city. Meanwhile, both GM and Ford continue to receive millions of dollars in subsidies from the federal government and the state government of Rio Grande do Sul, money that was redirected away from public services.
In Mexico, the privatization of pension funds, of the petrochemical industry and railroads, and public education, call into question national sovereignty and the historic conquests of the Mexican people. Privatizations are accompanied by the militarization of the country and bring about unprecedented levels of unemployment and misery. And along the U.S. border, the deregulated maquiladora sector continues to expand.
In Ecuador, the government's attempt to privatize the electricity sector has led to a workers' occupation of the Paute Power Works, which began in early September. This privatization effort, though, is not limited to electricity. The oil industry, telecommunications, social security and healthcare, ports and docks, public education, and even drinking water and irrigation are all coming under attack.
In Haοti, the policies designed to dismantle the public enterprises and services, which is carried out by the CMEP (Council for the Modernization of the Public Enterprises) at the behest of the World Bank, came to the end of its first phase with the liquidation of Haοti Cement last August. Among the consequences have been the growing foreign debt, which has increased from 4 to more than 14 billion gourdes; the quickly decling number of jobs in all sectors of the economy; rice imports which now exceed $1 billion, whereas in 1984 the country was essentially self-sufficent; and, to top it all off, 70% of the new state budget--for the past three years--is financed by international aid. Haοti has no real national budget.
Peru has seen the savage application of the policies of the multinational corporations and the international institutions that serve their interests. Wholesale privatization of state-owned industries and public services continues unabated. In the healthcare sector, those who can pay the most receive the best care, while the poor masses find their access to healthcare sharply reduced. Education and social security are the latest targets of the privatization assault. Jobs are disappearing, and recent legislative decrees have made it possible for corporations to lay off workers for virtually any reason. Those jobs that remain are more and more precarious.
These are but a few of the examples we heard in testimony from participants from throughout the Americas.
In the United States, the results of NAFTA are clear--despite the vain attempts of the Clinton Administration to cover up the facts. At least 400,000--and perhaps as many as 600,000 jobs--have been lost as a direct result of NAFTA. Employers continue to threaten plant closures and production shifts to Mexico in the drive to lower the wages of all U.S. workers and hamper union organizing attempts.
In their drive for maximum profits, global corporations pit working people, our communities, and entire nations against one another in a downward spiral of take-backs, concessions, and direct assaults--what has come to be known appropriately as the "race to the bottom." They continue their disastrous practices of racial discrimination and segregation against people of color.
In country after country, the workers and people have begun to rise in struggle against these attacks.
This conference is an important step forward in the fight against the employers and the international financial institutions and governments in their service. To this wholesale assault upon the working and poor people of the hemisphere, there can be but one response--greater cooperation, unity, and solidarity amoung us. In the face of global capitalism, we are determined to build and strengthen global unionism. We have gathered together despite our different points of views, our different political origins, and our different traditions. We are united by our common adversary to make a united stand in defense of the rights, working conditions, and living standards of our peoples.
We have succeeded in drawing common conclusions. NAFTA and the other free trade agreements, along with structural adjustment:
· an assault upon our rights and upon our working and living conditions, and stand as barriers to social progress and democracy.
· elevate the transnational corporations and their interests above those of the peoples of each country. The MAI seeks to make this international law.
· have, at their core, the aim of destroying public services, collective bargaining, labor codes, and the capacity of peoples to resist the drive to make them servants of global capital.
· are in no way intended to broaden the opportunities for employment. Rather, they destroy jobs for many while creating work for only a few. A growing number of our peoples are left worse off, while a small elite is enriched.
Through NAFTA and the other free trade agreements, employers and governments seek to undermine the independence of trade unions that stand for the defense of working people and our interests. The strategy of transnational capital is to cripple or remove all institutions that provide working people the capacity to resist the insatiable drive for ever greater profits.
In summary, NAFTA, MAI, and the other free trade agreements, along with structural adjustment, are an affront to democracy, to the rights of workers, to the rights of people to determine their own destiny. They overrule ILO Conventions and UN human rights treaties.
What can be done? We represent an immense force, one with the capacity to wage a vigorous fight against these attacks we have described. We have discussed and debated, and we now call upon workers, activists, and labor and other peoples' organizations throughout the hemisphere and the world--particularly the organizations of women, the doubly and triply oppressed--to expand and strengthen our communication, cooperation, and capacity for common action.
We propose a common day of action against the extension of NAFTA, against the continued privatization and destruction of our public services, and against the continued attacks on our rights and gains. We aim to hold this common day of action in April 1998, on the day when the heads of state from throughout the Americas will convene in Chile to discuss the creation of the FTAA.
We constitute this Conference as a Continuations Committee, under the direction of the convenors, to implement this decision.
Ours is a call for justice and democracy, for workers' and peoples' rights, for the rights of women, youth, children, and all the oppressed, for a militant campaign to stem the tide of these vicious assaults against our unions, our jobs, our standards of living, our rights, and all the gains we have won in struggle. In the face of global capital, we seek to build global unionism. Join us in building actions in every country of North America, Central America, Latin America, and the Caribbean.
No to NAFTA!
No to FTAA!
No to MAI!
Stop privatizations and deregulation!
(adopted unanimously)
Karen Talbot, Director, Committee on International Support for Trade Union Rights (CISTUR)
Katie Quan, Northern California Director, UNITE!
Art Pulaski, Secretary-Treasurer, California Labor Federation
Walter Johnson, Secretary-Treasurer, S.F. Labor Council
Jack Henning, Secretary-Treasurer Emeritus, California Labor Federation
Ed Rosario, Coordinator, Western Hemisphere Workers' Conference
Hebe de Bonafini, President, Madres de Plaza de Mayo (Committee of Mothers of the Disappeared) Argentina
Mary Tong, Director, Maquiladora Workers Support Committee (San Diego)
Enrique Hernandez, organizer of the new independent union at Han Young/Hyundai maquiladora plant in Tijuana, Mexico
Jorge Cuellar Valdez, Director International Affairs, SUTAUR-100 bus union (Mexico)
Frank Mannie, President, Nal-Nishii Federation of Labor (chartered by AFL-CIO as the labor federation of the indigenous nations-USA)
Luiz Eduardo Greenhalg, Federal deputy, Workers Party (Brazil)
Brian Henderson, Secretary-Treasurer, Canadian Postal Workers Union (Edmonton Local)
Henry Michel, General secretary, Airport Employees Union/SEDA (Haiti)
Luis Mesina Marin, Representative, National Bankworkers Union of Chile
Frank Martin del Campo, National Executive Board, Labor Council for Latin American Advancement/LCLAA
Art Pulaski, Secretary-Treasurer, California Federation of Labor (AFL-CIO)
Tony Mazzocchi, Special assistant to the president of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers' Union/OCAW
Julio Turra, National Executive Board and representative, United Federation of Workers of Brazil/CUT
Juan Jose Gorritti Valle, General Secretary, General Workers Federation of Peru/CGTP
Victor Manuel Gallardo Bravo, Exec. Bd., INECEL (Ecuador)
Salvador Duarte, General Secretary, National Transport Workers Union of El Salvador
Tafazzul Hussain, President, Bangladesh National Workers Federation (Bangladesh)
Chery Fequiere, President, National Transport Workers Union and United Labor Front/FOS (Haiti)
Miguel Mejνa, National Secretary, Movement of the United Left (Dominican Republic)
Raul Moron Orozco, General Secretary, Section 18, National Teachers Union of Mexico (SNTE-CNTE)
David Orchard, Coordinator, Citizens Concerned About Free Trade (Saskatoon, Saskatchewan - Canada)
Daniel Gluckstein, Coordinator, Workers International Liaison Committee (ILC); co-chair, French Committee to Abrogate the Maastricht Treaty (France)
Patrick Hebert, Trade Unionist (France)
Robin Alexander, Director of International Labor Affairs of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America/UE (Pittsburgh, Pa.)
John Riojas, Int'l Vice President and Director of International Affairs, Teamsters' Union (San Antonio, Texas)
Mike Dolan, Field Director, Public Citizen, Global Trade Watch (Washington, D.C.)
Baldemar Velasquez, President, Farm Labor Organizing Committee/AFL-CIO (Toledo, Ohio)
Stan Gacek, Western Hemisphere Director, International Affairs Department, AFL-CIO (Washington, D.C.)
Norbert Gbikpi-Benissan, General Secretary, National Federation of Independent Unions of Togo
Robert Irminger, Picket captain, U.S. chapter, International Committee for Victory to the Liverpool Dockers
Alan Benjamin, Assistant coordinator, Western Hemisphere Workers Conference
Millie Phillips, Volunteer coordinator, Western Hemisphere Workers Conference
Juliette Beck, California Fair Trade Campaign
Speakers at Issue Workshops:
Brian McWilliams, President, International Longshore and Warehouse Union/ILWU
Scott Littlehale, Public Policy Department AFL-CIO
Emanuel Mellato, President, Auto Workers Union of Campinas (Brazil)
Ronald St. Jean, Coordinator, Workers and Peasants Party (Haiti)
Roque Ferreira, Exec. Bd., National Railworkers Union of Brazil
Luis Vasquez, Coordinator, Mexican chapter, International Liaison Committee
Humberto Brizuela, Committee for the Abrogation of NAFTA (Mexico)
Larry Martinez, International Rep., Graphic Communications International Union/GCIU (Washington, D.C.)
Judith Barish, Communications Director, California Labor Federation
Markus Sokol, National Executive Board, Workers Party of Brazil
Eva Royale, Representative, United Farm Workers (UFW)
Barbara Prear, Public Workers Union/UE Local 150 (Hillsborough, North Carolina)
Victor Menotti, Program Director, International Forum on Globalization
Delpe Tuneb, General Secretary, National Progressive Democratic Party of Haiti
Juarez Pinheiro, Member City Council, Porto Alegre (Brazil)
Jacqueline Pettitot, Representative, Association of Workers of Martinique
Stephen Lewis, Chair, COPE, SEIU Local 509 (Boston, Mass.)
Elie Domota, United Federation of Workers of Guadeloupe
Kevin Danaher, Coordinator, Global Exchange
Luis Fernando Campis, Representative, National Union of Public Workers of Brazil
Brenda Cochrane, Labor Studies Director, S.F. State University
Norman Solomon, media critic, syndicated columnist
Pharis Harvey, Director, International Labor Rights Fund (Washington, D.C.)
Trim Bissell, Nat'l Coordinator, Campaign For Labor Rights
Mike Griffin, Director, War Zone Educational Foundation (Decatur, Ill.)
Sasha Futran, Board of Directors, KQED Radio
Tony Wohlfarth, Canadian Auto Workers Union (Canada)
Peter Donohue, consulting economist
Peter Lumsdaine, Latin America Program Director, Resource Center for Nonviolence (Santa Cruz, Calif.)
Joao Vitor Domingues, Representative, National Judicial Workers Union of Brazil
Guadalupe Yaρez, worker at Hyundai (Han Young) plant in Tijuana (Mexico)
Steve Zeltzer, Labor Video Project (San Francisco)
Gemma Lopez Limon, Researcher, U. of Mexicali (Mexico)
Jack Heyman, Exec. Bd., ILWU Local 10
Virginia Lourdes Galvan, Rep., Section 9 (Mexico City) of the National Teachers Union/SNTE-CNTE (Mexico)
Elvira Triana, Madres de Plaza de Mayo (Argentina)
Don Fitz, Editor, Synthesis-Regneration (journal of the Green Party/USA)
Silvia Mayorga, Representative, INECEL (Ecuador)
Doris Crosby, Director, CGTP Women's Commission (Peru)
Emma Guadalupe Leal Lombilla, Coordinator, Mexico Network of Trade Union Women (Mexico)
Maria Elena Tapia, National Electrical Workers Union/INECEL (Ecuador)
Ralph Schoenman, National Writers Union, UAW Local 1981
Dave Stratman, Educational consultant, Edit., New Democracy
Carlos Petroni, Director, Papers For All Campaign
Speakers at Sector Workshops:
Brian Lewis, President, No. Bay UTU
Lorenzo Cortes, Retiree, Mexico National Railworkers Union
John Murphy, San Francisco State University
Tracy Lingo, Food First
Raul Josue Morachis, high school student (Mexicali, Mexico)
Howard Wallace, SEIU Local 250
Ramon Juan Betanzos, Rep., Section 14 of the National Social Security Workers Union (Mexico)
Francisco Nogueira, Vice President, Dockworkers Union of Santos (Brazil)
Jeff Engels, ILWU (Seattle, Wash.)
Robin David, IBEW Local 1245
Marsha Feinland, Alameda Education Association
Yolanda Mora, UNITE!
Lucho Mauricio, Exec. Board, Painters Local 4
Camron Austin, UAW (Decatur, Ill.)
Paulo Rodrigues Lopes, President, Civil Construction Workers Union of Curitiba (Brazil)
Other Conference Participants:
Irma Addison (American Postal Workers Union/APWU-San Francisco); Rousel Aguilar Brindia (Representative, Section 7, National Teachers Union, SNTE-CNTE, Mexico); Bruce Allen; James Altenberg; Dick Andrews (CWA Local 21); Mario Antonio da Silva (Representative, State Employees Union of Santa Catarina, Brazil); Diana Arizaga Marury (INECEL, Ecuador); Wladimir Atapuma Ortiz Cetijo (INECEL, Ecuador); Peter Atwood; Joseph Aussedat (ILC-Quebec); Maria Avalos (Richmond High School); Carlos Avitia (Molders International Union-San Jose, Calif.); Ray Baeza (South Bay LCLAA); Neal Baker; Leslie Barnhorn; Martha Baskin (AFTRA); Graciela Becerril Lopez (National Social Security Workers Union, Mexico); Medea Benjamin (Global Exchange); Antonio Bernardoz Ancigo (SNTE section 18, Mexico); Bill Bishop (Korea News Agency); Rochelle Black (Richmond High School); Lita Blanc (UESF); Jeff Blankfort (NEA); Diana Bohn (50 Years is Enough); Paulo Borges Verani (Rep., National Teachers Union of Brazil); Barbara Bowman (Militant Labor Forum); Ed Boyce (GCIU Web 4); Richard Brooks Alba (SF LCLAA); Garrett Brown (Maquilador Health and Safety Network); Sydney Brown; John Budesa (ILWU Local 10); Susan Bryan (Bay Area Alternative Press); Lonnie Butler (IFPTE Local 21); Bruce Campbell; Dave Campbell (Peace and Freedom Party); David P. Campbell; Eduardo Caron (Top Knot Filmworks); Ana Castro Cornejo (CETI, Ecuador); Yolanda Catzalco (Golden Gate Labor Party); Joabe Cavalcanti (Representative, Metropolitan Transportation Workers Union of Recife, Brazil); Nilo Cayuqueo (Abaya Yola Fund); Gina Marie Cevallos (CHRIA); Silvia Chaidez; Miriam Ching Louie; Wayson Chow; Dan Chumley; Kate Chumley; Tina Collier (UFCW Local 428); Tom Condit (Peace and Freedom Party); Jan Cook (artist); Scott Cooper (National Writers Union, UAW Local 1981, Boston, Mass.); Peter Cooper (SEIU Local 250); Sharon Cornu (GCIU 583); Sid Corrales (SEIU Local 250); George Cousart (APWU); Karen Crump (Data Center Informational Services, Latin America); Dora Cruz (United Farm Workers); Manuel Cuso (Informaciones Obreras, Spain); Doug Cuthbertson (Conference of Newspaper Unions/SF); Alfredo Datangel (APWU); Celia Davis (Data Center); Rosylin Deaniam (Newspaper Guild Local 98); Franηois De Massot (Workers Party, France); Daniel Del Solar (Public Broadcasting); Mark Demming (Oakland Education Association); Michael Eisenscher (CWA); Riva Enteen (California Faculty Association); Johnny Espinoza (ILWU-Long Beach, Calif.); Ann Fagan Ginger (California Faculty Association); Bill Ferguson (50 Years is Enough); Claudio Fernandes (Top Knot Filmworks); Enrique Fernandez Felix (Union de Defensa Labor Comunitaria, Tijuana, Mexico); Luis Fernando; Roque Ferreira (Representative, National Railworkers Union, Brazil); Jennifer Ferrigno (CISPES-SF); Glenn Fieldman (California Faculty Association); Sasha Fierstein; Dennis Fitzgerald; Joe Flores (UAW Local 2244); Alexei Folger (Golden Gate Labor Party); Lorajo Foo (Asian Law Caucus); Connie Ford (OPEIU Local 3); Elsa Forrest; Marianne Gabriel; Peter Gaine (GCIU Local 583); Erik Gallun; Virginia Lourdes Galvan Antonio (Representative, Section 9, National Teachers Union, Mexico); Yolanda Gara; Benjamin Garcia Esquivel (Section 18, National Teachers Union, Mexico); Clara Gardner (United Farm Workers); Batista Gariglio Filho (Representative, Metro Workers Union, Belo Horizonte, Brazil); Mauricio Garofallo (Representative, Bank Workers Union of Santa Catarina, Brazil); Alejandro Garza (SEIU Local 1000/CSEA); Judy Gatewood (Carpenters Local 22); Thelma Genecin (UTLA); Earl Gilman (El Topo); Jacques Girod (newspaper workers union, CGT-Force Ouvriere, France); Olivia Given (DSA); Amos Glick; Jose Gomes (State Deputy, Workers Party, Porto Alegre, Brazil); Jaime Gonzalez (LCLAA, Pica Rivers, Calif.); Lili Gninivi (Togolese Refugee Coalition); Macarena Gomez-Barris (Data Center, Latin America); Jim Gotesky (Militant Labor Forum); Serge Goulart (National Directorate, Workers Party, Brazil); Kurt Gray (Sign and Display Local 5 10); Amy Gray (Radical Women); Nato Green; Yolanda Guerra (SEIU Local 535); Ana Guerra (United Farm Workers); John Gulick (ILC); Bill Guthrie (UA Local 393); Rosemary Gutierrez R.; Andy Hagelshaw (CISPES); James Hamilton (St. Louis Teachers Association); Dana Hamilton; Asher Harer (Retiree, ILWU); Ruth Harer (Retiree, OPEIU Local 3); Norma Harrison (50 Years is Enough); Rachael and Gordon Haskell (People's Democratic Club of Santa Cruz, Calif.); Martha Hawthorne (SEIU Local 790); Tim Hays (UNITE!); Ali Hebshi (SEIU, Labor Party, San Diego); Kay Heidkamp (Support Committee for Maquiladora Workers); Jesus Hermosillo (Global Exchange); Rudy Hernandez (Teamsters Union); Norman Hernandez Aguas (CETI, Ecuador); Sandra Hernandez-Askin; Cudberto Hernandez Valdιs (National Electrical Workers Union/SME, Mexico); Werner Hertz; Catherine Highet; Charlie Hinton (GCIU, Inkworks); Fred Hirsch (UA Local 393); Joan Holden (SF Mime Troupe); Charles Idelson; Todd Jailer; Edward Johnson (UAW Local 2244); Sheldon Jones (IFPTE Local 21); Ismael Jose Cesar (Representative, National Union of Public Employees, Brazil); Ramon Juan Betanzos (Representative, Section 14, National Social Security Workers Union, Mexico); Dan Kaplan (AFT Local 1493); Nancy Kato (Radical Women); Joe Keffer (California Nurses Association); Kay King (Fair Trade Works, Seattle); Dave King (Jobs with Justice, Portland, Oregon), Laurie King (Jobs with Justice, Portland, Oregon); Rick Kissell (CWA Local 32100, Milwaukee, Wisc.); William Klinke (OPEIU Local 3); Karl Kramer (UFCW Local 101); Gloria La Riva (BATU Local 21); Pierre Labossiere (BAHACO); Tom Lacey (Golden Gate Labor Party); Ronald Landingham (SEIU Local 1000); Lawrence Lane (IAM Local 1781); Nick Lapusan (student, St. Louis); Connie Lara (United Farm Workers); Nan Lashuam (Center for Labor Rights); Jeff Lawhead; Michelle Lee; Robert Lehman (San Franciscans for Tax Justice); Leucimeri Lelibron (State Legislative Assembly, Rs, Brazil); Bernard Levy; Lori Liederman; Charlene Lilie (SEIU Local 715); Alice Lindstrom (APWU); Tom Linebarger (Painters Local 913); Kathy Lipscomb (SEIU Local 250); Jesus Manuel Lizarraga Ruiz (Representative, Section 14, National Social Security Workers Union, Mexico); Cajuste Lexiuste (Past General Secretary, General Workers Federation/CGT, Haiti); Dave Long (Jobs with Justice); Fred Lonidier (AFT Local 12005, San Diego); Rey Lopez (Seafarers Union); Miriam Ching Louie (AIWA); Caroline Lund (UAW Local 2244); Virginia Maher; Juan Manuel Macedo (Section 18, National Teachers Union, SNTE-CNTE, Mexico); Warren Mar (AFL-CIO Organizing Department); Elizabeth Martinez (Professor, Ethnic Studies); Ramona Martinez (City Councilwoman, GCIU, Colorado); Steve Marquardt (Center for Labor Studies, University of Washington); Alex Mayer; Sam McAfee (SOJA); Frank McMurray (Sweat Magazine); Kevin Media; Mary Ann Medina (APWU); Toni Mendocino (Radical Women); Alexander Mendoza (Richmond High School); Alissa Messer; Giuliana and William Milanese Sorro; Kirsten Moller; Moises Montoya (FSP); Darrin Morgan; Ken Morgan (ILC); Jen Morley (CISPES); Dennis Mosgofian (Web Press Local 4-N); Dan Moutot (Workers Party, France); Bert and Lois Muhly (Coalition for Nicaragua); Becky Nassare (APWU); Manny Neves (Teamsters Local 85); Katherine Nguyen (Top Knot Filmworks); Doug Norberg (Collision Course Video Productions); Kelly Novak; Tarson Nuρes (Brazil); Katherina Nuρez-Adler (SEIU Local 1877); Gregoria Ochoa Monge (MUPI/Sonora, Mexico); Brian O'Flynn (International Society for Ecology and Culture); Peter Olney; Juan Patino (Richmond High School); Fred Pecker (ILWU Local 6); Casey Peek (SOJA); Maria Elena Peρaranda; Holly Pence; Gene Pepi (Frontline Newspaper); Laurie Pepper; Hayden Perry (retired lithographer); Doug and Hoda Perry (Union Publications Inc.); Christina Perez; Arlette Perret (CGT-Force Ouvriere, France); Art Persyko (Teamsters Local 85); Judy Phetdaravarah (Richmond High School); Diana Phoenix (ILWU Local 6); Elizabeth Pike; Valentin Ponce (Richmond High School); Erin Potts (Milarepa Fund); Ed Powell (AFT 243, Madison, Wisc.); Ed Prado (ILWU Local 10); Ruben Prado del Val (Section 18, National Teachers Union, Mexico); Giselle Quezada (CWA Local 9410); Bob Quinn (IBEW Local 1245); Jose Quintana (SEIU Local 250/ILWU Local 6); Jean-Pierre Raffi (Workers Party, France); Linda Ray (SEIU Local 790); Leslie Reif; Marcy Rein (Editor, Dispatcher, ILWU); Roberto Reyes Cosari (Section 18, National Teachers Union, Mexico); Marc Rich (UTLA); Louie Rocha (President, CWA Local 9423); Miguel Romero (APWU); Katie Romich (DSA); Jessica Romm (USF professor); Rob Rooke (Carpenters 713); Albert Roosma (Carpenters Local 405); Iris Rosario; Eric Ruano (Richmond High School); Kristin Rutter (Data Center); Sharon Rutter; Tom Ryan (AFL-CIO Community Services); Meuy, Mary and Sawkoui Saechao (Richmond High School); Jean Sainz; Michaeline Saluey; Julie Samples (Global Exchange); Raquel Sancho (Sccosh/Watch); Norton Sandler (Militant Labor Forum); Jorge Sandoval O'Campo (Section 18, National Teachers Union, Mexico); Ralph Sato; Susan Schacher; Ann Schaeffer; Sergio Schoklender (Madres de Plaza de Mayo, Argentina); Barbara Schumacher; Fred Seavey (SEIU Local 250); Marta Segura (UCLAA LOSH); Harvey Shaiken (Professor, U. of California-Berkeley); Anne Shea (Golden Gate Labor Party); Barry Sheppard (Left-Green Weekly); Bill Shields; Mya Shone (SEIU Local 250); Matt Siegfried (UFCW Local 876); Harry Siitonen; Maurino Silva (Representative, Public Employees Union of Santa Catarina); Denise Simonetto (Representative, Striking Performing Artists of Sao Paulo, Brazil); Bernard Smallwood (IBEW Local 1245); Ted Smith (Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition); Peter Solenberger (UAW Local 1981); Xiomara Solorzano (Richmond High School); Sally Soriano (Fair Trade Works, Seattle); Tonya Soidleman (interpreter); Bill Sparks (Sign and Display Local 510); Frances Steadman (Gray Panthers); Ruby Stein (50 Years is Enough); Hunter Stern (IBEW Local 1245); Timothy Stinson; Jack Stone; Sara Stowell (CISPES); Sandra Sueli de Jesus Bastos (Representative, National Union of Judiciary Workers, Brazil); Adrienne Suffin (SEIU Local 1000); Gigi Szabo; Greg Tate; Jean Taylor (APWU); Suzanne Teran (Labor Occupational Health Program); Marcia Thorndike (UFCW Local 101); Victor Toman; Ezequiel Torres (Representative, National Department of Planning Workers Union, Mexico); Rodrigo Toscano (Golden Gate Labor Party); Al Traugott (IAM Local 562); Joe Trigueros (SF LCLAA); Lorraine Truitt (Bay Area Committee for Victory to Liverpool Dockers); Richard Trujillo (Vice President, ATU Local 265); Hung Q. Tu (Golden Gate Labor Party); Marshall Uran; Jose Valdir (Member, City Council, Porto Alegre, Brazil); James Vann (Independent Political Progressive Network); Miriam Vaz Parente (Representative, Union of Public Employees of Brasilia/DF, Brazil); William Vealey (UA Local 230); John Veen (CSEA/Labor Party); Vania Verani (teacher, Brazil); Aaron Vick; Joao Vitor Dominguez (Representative, National Judiciary Workers Union, Brazil); David Wald (LACES); David Walters (IBEW Local 1245); Adrian Weiss; Phyllis Willet; Nancy Wohlforth (President, OPEIU Local 3); Nellie Wong (Radical Women); Stan Woods (ILWU Local 6); Pat Wright (Sign and Display Local 510); Dave Young; Elliot Zais (AFSCME, Oregon); Emily Zimmerman (Korean Workers Center); Erica Zweig (LaborNet).
Article on Conference reprinted from the San Francisco Bay Guardian
Global Re-Union: International Labor Leaders Meet in S.F.
(reprinted from San Francisco Bay Guardian, November 19, 1997)
By CHRISTOPHER D. COOK
Denouncing capitalism with uncharacteristic bluntness, labor leaders from 15 nations condemned corporate-backed free trade and privatization at the Western Hemisphere Workers' Conference in San Francisco last weekend, calling for international labor solidarity to combat rising underemployment and attacks on workers' wages, health and safety, and organizing rights across the globe.
Setting a strident labor-versus-capital tone that echoed throughout the three-day affair, former California Labor Federation leader John F. Henning said, "Let us never forget: capital was never invented for the protection of workers, not for their protection or their advance." To thunderous applause, he added, "The answer to global capitalism is global unionism. There is no other way."
Energized by the recent rejection of President Clinton's fast-track authority to negotiate NAFTA and other trade agreements, some 300-plus delegates, including trade unionists from Togo, Bangladesh, and El Salvador, focused on stemming what a conference declaration called the "growing misery and increasing social and economic inequality for the mass of working people, peasants, and the poor of our countries." The litany of concerns included the spread of child labor, the persistence of unequal pay and the lack of political representation for women, environmental degradation, and attacks on immigration.
Conference delegates proposed numerous responses, including an international day of action against free-trade agreements next April in Chile, where leaders from North and South America will meet to discuss the launching of the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas; participants also proposed increasing international organizing among rank-and-file workers without intervention from union leaders, and more cross-border organizing campaigns.
The event, hosted by the San Francisco Labor Council, highlighted NAFTA-like expansions of free trade and deregulated capital that loom on the horizon. Participants warned that the Multilateral Agreement on Investments (MAI), an international treaty designed to give investors nearly unlimited access to foreign markets, poses grave hazards for workers and poor nations. Jorge Cuellar Valdez, director of international affairs for a Mexico City bus drivers' union, said the MAI and "structural adjustment programs" imposed by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund are pressuring governments "to impose the domination of speculative capital and wipe out domestic industries." As transnational investors and financiers pry open new markets and expand privatizations, workers throughout Mexico and Central and South America are suffering from mass layoffs, poverty wages, and in many cases, government efforts to quash organizing, conference participants said.
At the Han Young/Hyundai maquiladora plant in Tijuana this October, workers making just $4 a day voted for an independent union, said Mary Tong, executive director of the San Diego-based Support Committee for Maquiladora Workers. But in early November Mexico's labor board invalidated the vote and installed a government-run union, confirming that "the right to organize does not exist at this time in maquiladoras in Mexico," Tong said.
Pro-union Han Young workers were subjected to bribery, intimidation, and layoffs, according to Tong, who is lobbying the Clinton administration to invoke sanctions, contained within the NAFTA side agreement, against the Mexican government. Unions in 27 U.S. cities have lent their support to the Han Young struggle, said Tong, whose committee is discussing with the International Longshoreman and Warehouseman's Union (ILWU) an effort to refuse Hyundai shipments in some U.S. ports.
While Clinton's intervention may help the Han Young workers, the issue of union-government relations sparked sharp differences at the conference over whether and how unions should negotiate with governments. The prime points of contention were the AFL-CIO's cold war collaborations with CIA campaigns to sabotage left-wing trade unions in Central and South America, and a debate over whether unions should oppose free-trade expansion altogether or push for "side agreements" enforcing labor and environmental protections. Stan Gacek, western hemisphere director for the AFL-CIO's international affairs department, acknowledged distinctions over trade issues, saying, "We have never said we are against trade per se, but we are against trade expansion without real labor rights within it." But Humberto Brizuela, of Mexico's Committee for the Abrogation of NAFTA, argued that side agreements to pacts such as NAFTA validate the expansion of capitalism's inherently antilabor agenda.
Governments' antilabor policies affected the conference itself. The entire Cuban delegation was denied visas by the U.S. government, which, with support from the AFL-CIO, continues its embargo against the socialist country. Gacek, asked if the AFL-CIO will change that policy, told the Bay Guardian that officials there are reviewing several proposals to end the organization's pro-embargo stance.
Haitian authorities let just 4 of 21 proposed delegates from the hemisphere's poorest nation attend the conference. Although it hosted the anti-privatization conference, the San Francisco Labor Council has itself been criticized over the years for failing to protest, and in some cases for supporting, local privatization measures. The council never came out against the corporate power-grab of the Presidio National Park; likewise, the council's bylaws deny endorsement of any candidate who supports public power. Asked if the council might reconsider those positions, conference organizer and council member Ed Rosario told the Bay Guardian, "I hope so."