Adapting to Remain Relevant

KOMPAS/DIDIE SW

.

We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them. –Albert Einstein

The struggles to improve the future of laborers will never be effective if we always keep to the old ways. Industrial and technological developments have fundamentally changed the structure of the job market. The service sector is becoming increasingly dominant while job ties are becoming more abstract with the emergence of business relationships without an employer-employee hierarchy.

This requires a revision of early labor movement theories, as some are no longer relevant today in fighting for laborers’ needs. In celebrating International Workers’ Day on May 1 this year, labor unions should promote the issue of their revitalization as a major theme. This should replace the issue of better pay that has often been the central theme of May Day commemorations in years past.

Amid the celebration of the manifestation of workers’ might, introspection may be helpful to reflect on the achievements and the challenges of the workers’ struggle. I do not mean to spread pessimism on labor movement leaders who have done marvelous work over the years. It is just that I am deeply concerned over the strategies and scenarios of struggle across the majority of labor unions today. I fear that we are heading towards bankruptcy in our movement.

Double pressure

Labor unions today face double pressure, both from within and without. Let me start by mentioning the fact that our labor unions are getting weaker, as our membership has plummeted from 3.5 million people (verified Labor Ministry data, 2000) to 2.7 million (2015). This is accurate proof of a gigantic problem within our labor unions, namely in recruitment strategy and in maintaining member loyalty.

The frequency of labor protests nationwide may not drop, new labor unions are cropping up and the national workforce is ever expanding. How come, then, that union membership is decreasing? This erosion of membership is not the result of union busting. Even if union busting has occurred, it has happened sporadically and is not the government’s official policy. Neither is it caused by deindustrialization, as data shows that industry growth is ever increasing.

The main cause is, in fact, within the labor movements themselves. Unions often break up due to conflicts between a movement’s leaders. These broken unions eventually become new unions with fewer members and smaller financial capability. Ironically, as the number of labor unions increases, the number of their members dwindles.

The idea behind forming labor unions in the past was to struggle for ideological interests and values. Labor unions should not be formed out of an emotional response or to seek position and money. Such motives will only lead to fragile labor unions with poor membership loyalty, resulting in the relative ease with which members switch to other unions.

Externally, there is the decreasing trend of workers in the manufacturing sector, which has always been the largest contributor to labor union membership. In the past 10 years, a major shift has occurred in the nation’s industry workforce, from the manufacturing sector to the service sector. Technological disruptions will change working relationships from the conventional bipartite (vertical relationships) to horizontal relationships based on revenue sharing. The Central Statistics Agency’s (BPS) 2017 data shows that only 20.49 percent of workers nationwide are in the manufacturing sector. Following the normal growth rate, it is estimated that only 7-10 percent of workers nationwide will be in the manufacturing sector 15 years from now (in 2033), while the number of workers in the service sector continues to grow.

The World Economic Forum’s The Future of Work (2016) mentions two drivers of change that will determine the future of work, namely 1) the demographic and socioeconomic factor and 2) the technological factor.

Change and adapt

With this double pressure, labor unions must adapt in order to remain relevant. This can begin by changing the labor movement paradigm, its strategy, recruitment methods, financial resilience, communication strategy and others. The situation will never be the same again; it is either adapt or die!

If unions refuse to change the strategy of their labor movements while the number of workers continues to dwindle and fragmentation leads to new labor unions, then the unions may one day be no longer relevant and a thing of the past. The Labor Ministry, as the party responsible for fostering industrial relations, should not remain a silent witness in this worsening situation. Under the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) “social-dialog” concept, industrial relations (both bipartite and tripartite) cannot possibly work if the labor unions are too weak.

Labor unions in Indonesia are far different from those in advanced countries. An effort to replicate their work is irrelevant. There is a unique factor that leads to the higher sustainability of labor unions in advanced countries, compared to those in developing countries such as Indonesia. Labor unions in advanced countries, such as in Europe, the US, Japan and several Latin America countries, allow all kinds of workers to join as members. These include civil servants and even police and military personnel, as well as retirees. From these public sector workers alone, labor unions can gain a membership of millions with huge and regular payment contributions. The United Kingdom, for instance, has a federation of labor unions called UNISON with 1.3 million members. Similarly, Canada has PSAC (180,000 members), the US has SEIU (2.1 million members) and Japan has JICHIRO (820,000 members).

The public sector is the main contributor of labor union members in advanced countries. Developing countries do not possess this characteristic. Advanced countries also generally have stipulations that social insurance and unemployment benefit claims can only be disbursed through labor unions. Therefore, it is a necessity for workers to join labor unions to have access to social security services. It is in this framework that labor unions in advanced countries are sustainable, as they have a permanent supply of new members.

A priority in preventing labor unions from shrinking is to push for a threshold for credible and representative labor unions. This is also to adhere to the ILO’s “the most representative” principle. Freedom of union is guaranteed, but labor unions with members above the national threshold can be priority partners to the government. To entice labor unions to the idea, the government should use the state budget to fund annual training for labor unions that pass the threshold. Labor unions that receive such funding will avoid any breakup in order to maintain itself above the national threshold. Other labor unions that do not have enough members to pass the threshold will be encouraged to merge with each other to reinforce their organizations and enjoy the threshold benefits.

This will not be hard to achieve, as political parties in Indonesia have already done so. A threshold exists, and passing it means funding assistance from the state budget. Happy Workers’ Day!

Rekson Silaban, Indonesia Labor Institute