[stop-imf] Trade unions successfully resist the World Bank and the IMF

[robert weissman]

INTERNATIONAL CONFEDERATION OF FREE TRADE UNIONS

ICFTU OnLine...
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Trade unions successfully resist the World Bank and the IMF

Brussels, 20 April 2006: Amidst growing consensus within global civil
society that the World Bank and the IMF do not address public concerns
when demanding that governments implement major economic policy changes,
the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) today
released a new report, Fighting for Alternatives: Case Studies of
Successful Trade Union Resistance to the Policies of the World Bank and
IMF.  The report was released to coincide with the 2006 Spring Meetings
of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund in Washington, to
be held on April 22-24.

According to the ICFTU report, trade unions and their civil society
allies in Africa, Asia, Europe, and Latin America have organized workers
to defeat World Bank and IMF-sponsored initiatives such as the
privatization of essential services, transport restructuring, and labour
market reform.  "The successful resistance by trade unions against the
World Bank and the IMF shows that the labour movement is a strong and
efficient tool in the fight against poverty and for the security of
workers' livelihoods" said Guy Ryder, General Secretary of the ICFTU. In
many of the cases presented in the report, trade unions and their allies
not only succeeded in reversing these initiatives, but also in obtaining
alternative policies that took account of their concerns.

Based on interviews with union leaders and on other first-hand accounts
of trade union campaigns, the new report presents detailed case studies
of popular campaigns against IMF and World Bank initiatives and the
successful adoption of alternative policies in countries including:

*        Bulgaria, where unions organized a national mobilization that
led to the overturn of a World Bank education sector restructuring
programme and an IMF proposal that would have reduced workers' wages;

*        Croatia, where five labour federations set aside their
differences to rally opposition to an IMF-World Bank proposal for labour
reform designed to make it easier for employers to fire workers;

*        Indonesia, where the nation's constitutional court ruled against
the IMF-backed privatization of a major utility after labour unions and
civil society groups filed a lawsuit contesting the government's right
to privatize the utility;

*        Uruguay, where trade unions took the lead in organizing a
historic national referendum against water privatization;

*        Zambia, where unions and their allies forced the IMF to rescind
debt relief conditions that required privatization of strategic public
enterprises and prohibited the hiring of new teachers.

The report also looks at the efforts of the international trade union
movement and its allies around the world to push the IMF and World Bank
to adopt more favourable policies towards working people and the poor,
which have lead to important changes in these institutions' policies on
core labour standards and debt relief for impoverished countries.

The ICFTU report is now available for download on the ICFTU website:
<http://www.icftu.org/displaydocument.asp?Index=991223658&Language=EN>.

The ICFTU represents 155 million workers in 236 affiliated organisations
in 154 countries and territories.  http://www.icftu.org
ICFTU is also a partner in Global Unions. http://www.global-unions.org

For more information, please contact the ICFTU Press Department on +32 2
224 0204 or +32 474 621 018.






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