UNI
Union-Network International

For more information, visit www.union-network.org

About UNI
UNI, a global union founded on January 1, 2000, is the worldwide trade union response to the new realities of the global economy. Globalization has led to the increased ability of corporations to wield power over workers. UNI's mission is to help affiliated unions and their members increase worker power in the 21st century environment. UNI encourages solidarity across borders, and raises issues of common concern with employers, governments and international bodies.

Today, UNI represents 15.5 million members, in 900 affiliated unions, from more than 140 countries around the world. It is the world's largest assembly of individual trade unions. In its first four years, UNI has successfully developed several global "framework agreements" that commit companies to adhere to higher standards for working conditions and environmental protection in all countries in which they operate. These standards include respecting workers' freedom to form a union and refraining from the use of child labor. These framework agreements transcend national boundaries, and lay the foundation for fair collective bargaining agreements with multi- national corporations whose operations also cross boarders.

Globalization and Power
In the last 20 years, the globalization of labor markets has changed the balance of power between employers and employees. Thanks to workers, local and regional companies have grown into national or multi-national corporations. But in their constant quest to cut costs and drive up profits, companies today are abandoning the workers who made them successful. They jump from nation to nation in search of the cheapest labor--even if it means exploiting child workers, paying poverty wages, or maintaining sweatshop conditions. Corporate CEOs cook their books and enrich themselves--even if it means laying off thousands of workers. Even governments have been complicit in corporate greed, rigging trade policies for their corporate political donors and enacting legislation to further erode workers' rights on the job.

Some multi-national corporations are so powerful, and so rich they act more like countries than businesses. By using millions in PAC money to buy political favors, corporations can insist on tax breaks and loopholes, suppress the rights of workers to organize, and break myriad labor laws. If eyebrows are raised, they can simply move their operations to a country where there are no consequences for bad behavior. Corporations can squeeze manufacturers in one country to cut production costs, forcing draconian pay and working conditions on workers - or they can simply take their business to a country where labor is cheaper. The global capital market means that corporations will continue to shift jobs from country to country, chasing cheap wages and weak labor laws.

UNI President and UFCW International President Joe Hansen spoke at UNI's 2nd World Congress in Chicago in 2005.

Employees, communities, even countries have been eliminated as stakeholders in the new global economy. In the global capital market, shareholders invest internationally, but they look for Wal- Mart - like companies in all industries. In this way, Wal-Mart competes not only with grocery and retail stores, but with airlines, automakers, and technology companies. Corporations are beholden only to investors, and look only to their bottom line. To be successful, companies must compete in the race to the bottom. As a result, innumerable companies suppress workers right to organize, slash health benefits, nation-hop in search of cheap labor, and employ countless other tactics from the Wal-Mart playbook. Workers, communities, local, regional, even national economies are at the mercy of corporations. No company -and no worker- is immune to the virus of Wal-Martization.

Re-building Worker Power
It used to be that loyal, productive workers were rewarded with good pay and decent benefits. Globalization, consolidation, and the Wal-Martization of the economy have changed the relationship between employers and employees. Employers within the same industries regularly coordinate strategy and collective bargaining agendas to alter the balance of power between companies and workers across states, regions, even countries. They use national and international funds to achieve their collective bargaining goals.

For five months in 2003-2004, UFCW workers staged the longest major strike in the history of the supermarket industry. Three employers, Vons/Safeway, Kroger, and Albertsons, pooled their resources, shared strategies and combined their power in an attempt to lower living standards, gut collective bargaining agreements and silence workers. These one-time local or regional employers had grown into giant corporations. Working together, they wielded immeasurable resources and the financial strength to absorb tremendous losses. And, they considered the billions in lost revenue caused by the strike as an investment in future profits. For the UFCW, it became clear that in order to pose a threat to a company's bottom line, strikes or other economic actions could no longer be confined to one locale, or one region. In the future, strategic coordination - in organizing and collective bargaining - among locals, regions, and within industries would be the only way to build worker power.

The UNI Solution
When companies were local, unions had local agreements. When companies were national, unions had national agreements. Now, in the global economy, global agreements are needed. In practice, global agreements include a commitment to observe international standards for the recognition of the right to join a union, to bargain collectively, and to non-discrimination in the workplace. Companies must agree to never use child or forced labor, to observe decent working conditions, and to adhere to environmental standards. In its first four years, UNI has successfully developed global "framework agreements" with companies such as H&M, Carrefour, Telefonica and others. The agreements commit the companies to adhere to higher standards in all countries in which they operate. These framework agreements transcend national boundaries, and lay the foundation for fair collective bargaining agreements with multi national corporations whose operations also cross boarders.

• UNI members in the USA, Canada, France, UK, Sweden, and Brazil took coordinated action in the same week against Quebecor, the second largest printing company in the world. The company met with UNI and Quebecor and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters reached an agreement in May 2005 on a new protocol concerning union organizing at the company's non-union facilities in the United States.
  
  
• UNI and Carrefour, a French multi-national, have agreed to work together to monitor and enforce the International Labor Organization conventions regarding the right of employees to join a union, the right to collective bargaining, and protection from discrimination. Working together with UNI, Carrefour has also condemned child and forced labor and intends to take active steps to ensure that ILO principles are respected by its suppliers as well.

Leadership & Vision
Joe Hansen, UFCW International President, was elected to serve as president of UNI at the organization's first World Congress in Berlin in 2001.

From his international activism, to his battle with powerful national supermarket chains during the historic 2003-3004 Southern California grocery workers strike, Hansen knows firsthand that today's corporations and capital markets - and the greed they foster - have no boundaries. Yet his rank-and-file activism and record of union building proves that worker Solidarity knows no boundaries either. His faith and confidence in the knowledge that industry-wide coordination is the only way to build real worker power serves as the foundation for his leadership of UNI. Hansen believes that as the effects of globalization ripple throughout an international workforce, so, too can worker Solidarity. Activated workers can organize, build their unions, confront corporate power -- across national borders -- and win.

Dedicated international activism has enabled Hansen to develop a deep understanding of the need to build global Solidarity among unions with common employers, industries, or concerns. Coordinated global union action is the only way to confront global corporations. Hansen's strongly held belief in worker Solidarity, in organizing to build worker power, and his practical and inspired vision for global trade unionism was a driving force behind the founding of UNI. Accordingly, Hansen was elected to serve as president of UNI at its first World Congress in Berlin in 2001. He is running unopposed for a second term, and an election will be held UNI's second World Congress in Chicago this month.