MODULE 7: SOCIOLOGY OF WORK, INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND LAW
SECTION 4: GLOBALISATION AND ITS IMPACT ON HEALTH AND SAFETY:
5: Trade Union Responses To Globalisation
 

5: TRADE UNION RESPONSES TO GLOBALISATION:

The trade unions internationally, and particularly in the developing countries have generally adopted a strong resistance to the process of globalisation and its impact on the workplace. Workers have had to endure job losses, increased job insecurity and increased occupational health and safety risks. These issues have been debated within union structures internationally and in South Africa. The following websites provides the reader with the viewpoints of some of these organisations:

  1. Globalisation and the neo-liberal agenda (Shopsteward: Volume 5 No.2 - April/May 1996).
  2. The new internationalism - a response to globalisation (Shopsteward Vol 6 No 2 - April 1997).
  3. COSATU 6th National Congress Resolution (Shopsteward Vol 6 No 5 - October 1997).
TAKE A POSITION:

Choose one of the following positions on globalisation and its impact on occupational health, and motivate your position:

"Globalisation, with all its shortcomings, has produced an environment of economic development, which is conducive to protecting the health of the worker. This is primarily done through the pressures on companies for international standardisation."

"Globalisation has had a major negative impact on the health of workers, particularly in developing countries. This is because governments and companies in such countries, eager to generate foreign income, and to ensure that their product is competitive on an international scale, are not prepared to invest in protecting the health of their workers."