Open
World Conference of Workers
In Defense of Trade Union Independence & Democratic Rights
SOVEREIGNTY AND MAQUILADORAS
by Mercedes Gema López Limón
(translation by Dan La Botz)
Where Is the Maquiladora Project Taking Us?
The maquiladora export industry is the cutting edge of "free
trade," of the commerce of the globalized world, of the new division
of labor, of flexibility in the productive process and deregulation of
labor. It is a clear example of de-localization, or the movement of firms
of the industrialized countries to the backward countries in order to
reduce labor costs.
According to the definition of the Mexican Institute of Statistics
(INEGI), "the maquiladora export industry is the ensemble of firms
and establishments that are engaged in carrying out some or various of the
stages of the productive process, generally of assembly or administration.
The maquila's activity involves the transformation, elaboration, and
repair of merchandise originating in a foreign country, temporarily
imported to be exported later." So, the provider of the maquilas is
also the purchaser of the product. (Dabat, 1996)
This is the policy most favored by the government to generate employment,
even though the recession in the United States led to the loss of hundreds
of thousands of jobs. The Baja California Secretary of Economic
Development pointed out at the end of 2003, that there were 218,871
workers, or 50,000 less than in previous years; in Mexicali there are
49,900 (La Crónica 07/03/04) and he confirms that in the last four months
employment as increased. Most of the investment capital comes from the
United States and Mexico, but there are also investments from Asian
countries such as Japan, Korea and others creating about 40 percent of the
jobs.
The maquiladora "boom" resulted principally from the low cost of
labor, tax exemptions, the creation of infrastructure and services with
industrial parks provided by the government. The peak of the maquiladoras
took place at the same time as the dismantling of national industry
aggravated by the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) which has
brought the country to the verge of destruction. With the negotiation of
the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) the entire continent will be a
great maqiladora at the service of the multinational corporations,
principally those of the United States.
The Maquiladora: Beyond National Sovereignty?
Here in Mexico, these corporations enjoy credit, tax exemptions, and
government stimulation of production, as well as the possibility of having
policies modified with changes in the market. They have been able to hire
"apprentices" paying them less than the minimum wage, and firing
workers, without compensation, who are no longer considered
"able." They have been able to increase or reduce their
personnel, and their hours and weeks of work and wages if the company
requires it. They have in practice modified the Federal Labor Law
regarding such policies as absenteeism and firings, and they have reduced
their payments to the national Social Security (health system) if they
establish a "short week," create "permanent"
positions, or give permanent employment after 90 days of work, etc. (Levy
and Alcocer, 1983). So, throughout the length and breadth of the country,
the maquiladoras are managed as spaces completely foreign to and outside
of national sovereignty. One of the defining characteristics of national
sovereignty, of course, is the observance and the operation of national
laws throughout a country's territory, in that way to regulate the
economic development of the country.
To be more precise, the most common violations of labor legislation are
the following:
- The failure to observe the legal work day of eight hours, and the
increasingly common practice of 10, 12, or 14 hours of continuous work,
and even the obligation to stay and work two shifts when production
requires it, at times that the company decides; together with that, the
violation of the payment of correct overtime, with the argument that in
this way the workers don't have to work on Saturdays.
- Work in the worst conditions of super-exploitation with exhausting speed
on the production lines.
- The lowest possible salaries that have no relationship whatsoever to the
fabulous profits that the companies make.
- Complete lack of health and safety on the job, and denial of information
about dangerous substances being worked with, lack of engineering to
protect workers, and not giving workers protective equipment. Frequently
there are not health and safety committees, or the committees have been
stacked in favor of the employer..
- The practice of sending injured workers to private physicians rather
than to Social Security (IMSS-the Mexican Institute of Social Security,
the public health system) to avoid having accidents reported and being
fined, a practice that militates against the interest of the workers.
- The practice of taking rest breaks or lunch breaks based on the
necessities of production.
- In not a few cases, the complete failure of the company to meet its
obligations to the Social Security system (IMSS).
- Firings without just cause and without the compensation required by law.
- The complacency of the authorities in the face of the "labor
cultures" that are imposed by the employers (above all the Korean
employers) which include mistreatment of the employees.
- The hiring of minors of both sexes on conditions similar to those of
adults, a practice prohibited by the Federal Labor Law (under the age of
13) unless with the special exceptions and protections for those 14 and 15
years of age.
- Run-away companies that expose workers to abuse and unemployment since
they arrive one day and pick up and leave the next, leaving their workers
completely vulnerable.
- The hiring of elderly women and men and people with disabilities into
poorer jobs and at wages worse than those of other workers.
- An absenteeism policy based on the rule that if a person misses one day
she or he is not allowed to come to work the next day, and sometimes for
two or three days.
- The labor authorities' complete bias in favor of the employers.
- The requirement that women workers produce a certificate to prove that
they are not pregnant when they apply for work, and to reproduce such
proof in order to keep their jobs, together with the firing of pregnant
women.
- The existence of "company unions" at the service of the
employer that create "protection contracts" (to protect the
employer) which are often signed even before the plant opens and begins to
run.
- The prohibition of the right of workers to form unions of their own
choosing, and therefore the lack of independent unions that defend the
interests of the workers.
All of this which takes place on a daily basis, but completely illegally,
is what employers hope to legalize with the "reform" of the
Federal Labor Law, part of the reforms that Fox proposes before entering
into the FTAA in 2005.
The Case of Daewoo and Those Fired For Attempting to Organize a Union
In the maquiladoars there are no unions, or, if there are, the workers
don't know anything about them and they do not serve them. They are
hostages of "official" leaders who used to serve the
Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) government, and who, since 1989,
have adapted to the government of the National Action Party (PAN). [The
PAN came to power in Baja California in 1989.]
Article 357 of the Federal Labor Law establishes that: "[W]orkers and
employers shall have the right to create unions without previous
authorization" [the sense of the law is that workers can create
unions for themselves and employers can create their own chambers of
commerce]. Article 358 notes, "No one can be obliged to organize or
join a union." In addition Mexico has since 1950 been a signatory to
Convention 87 of the International Labor Organization which guarantees the
right to labor union freedom and protects the right to unionize.
The businessmen who own the maquiladoras have no obstacle to their right
to organize. The press announced with great fanfare the names of those
involved in the employer organizations and publicizes their activities.
But the situation of the workers is altogether different. There is a long
history of the workers' struggle for the right to organize, and of the
obstacles that the employers, the authorities and the pro-company union
leaders place in their path. The explanation for this is that the great
business of the maquiladoras is based on the deplorable working conditions
and the wages (which are between 10 and 20 times less than those paid in
the country of origin of these firms), and which multiply the profits by
that much.
In September 2003, a group of workers at the Daewoo Orion of Mexico
(DOMEX) company organized to establish a union and went to the Labor Board
(JLCA) in order to comply with the law. As soon as the company learned of
this, it fired five of the leaders unjustly and without any compensation
and created an environment of severe hostility to labor in the factory,
threatening the workers and obliging some of them who were on the union
list to sign a document repudiating any association with the union. This
policy of terror meant that within a few days the workers no longer had
the 20 people needed to form a union. But this is only the first chapter
in a history that is still being written. ...
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Mercedes Gema López Limón
Researcher at Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales
of the Autonomous University of Baja California (UABC)
Email: glopez@uabc.mx