Official and Independent Unions Angle for Power in Mexico
Alexander, Robin & Gilmore, Peter
Mexican workers, whose newly developed labor movement had radical socialist and anarchist leadership, played a major role in the Mexican revolution of 1910. The pact between...
...Unions of this type have become known as "official" unions, because of their direct relationship with the PRI...
...In July, 1990, the government replaced the top leadership of the COR with its own loyalists...
...These unions are particularly prevalent in Monterrey, the base for two sindicato blanco federations...
...These unions present themselves as alternatives to the outmoded CTM...
...Government hostility is the major reason that independent unions are such a small part of the Mexican labor movement...
...In response to requests for assistance and affiliation from locals, including the Ford workers from Cuaititlan, COR agreed to submit to the government requests for certification...
...The actions of the COR leadership did not go unpunished...
...The Electrical Workers Union (SME), which is a member of FESEBES, also has a militant history, and its democratic traditions are greatly respected within the union movement...
...Although relatively small, FAT has influence dis- proportional to its size, due to its principled deter- mination to create independent, democratic unions under extremely adverse conditions...
...Many CTM leaders are important PRI politicians, often controlling the PRI machine at the local level...
...The Federation of Goods and Services Unions (FESEBES), formed in early 1990 by unions of tele- phone workers, electrical workers, pilots, flight attendants, and trolley drivers, is yet another example of the new unionism...
...The Authentic Labor Front (FAT) is a federation of inde- pendent unions, cooperatives, and farmworker and community organizations, comprising some 50,000 members...
...it established the eight-hour workday, and minimum-wage and over-time standards...
...it protected the rights of women and children...
...As a result, most union members were until very recently required to join the PRI...
...In the late 1980s, for example, the PRI-affiliated Revolu- tionary Workers Confederation (COR) opposed the government's wage-control program and partici- pated in the founding of a progressive labor coali- tion, the United Workers Front...
...Democratic currents are present within the offi- cial unions, reflected in the attempts of some unionists to establish independent locals...
...Thus, workers may go for years without any knowledge that they are "represented"-with no knowledge of their officers, no meetings, and no actual representation...
...In addition to the official unions, there are the sindicatos blancos (white unions), which are company unions that are not independent in any real sense...
...Dues for both the union and the party were often automatically deducted from workers' pay...
...As part of its modernization effort, and to improve Mexico's image abroad, the Salinas govern- ment has attempt- ed to distance itself somewhat from the official unions...
...During the 1970s, movements for indepen- dent, democratic unions developed in many different sectors...
...Mexican labor law requires that unions obtain "juridical personality" (a charter granting legal recognition) from the government...
...and it declared that workers must share in industry's profits...
...In many cases, dues were automatically deducted from workers' pay for both the union and the party...
...Salinas has attacked many of the old-line, corrupt CTM bureaucrats, often replacing them with "modernizers" who support his program...
...Believing that modernization is inevitable, they push for as large a role as possi- ble in controlling how change affects their mem- bers...
...Breaking with tradi- tion, FESEBES did not require that union locals be members of the PRI...
...The official unions lack democratic procedures such as membership meetings and secret-ballot elections...
...These were met with a combination of violent repression and co- optation...
...in 1940, he became general secretary, a post he has held ever since...
...FAT national offi- cers were, moreover, quoted extensively in the international press...
...Until very recently, most union members were required to join the PRI...
...FESEBES is, however, criticized by many pro- gressives for supporting Salinas' neoliberal policies, including NAFTA...
...With the backing of President Lazaro Cardenas, it quickly became the dominant labor federation in Mexico...
...These politicians/union bureaucrats control vast amounts of patronage, and have the police at their disposal...
...Over the years, FAT has pro- vided crucial organizational and political support to many parts of the independent union move- ment which were not formally connected to it, as well as to democratic currents within the official unions...
...Formed in 1960, FAT now represents workers in a wide variety of industries in over half the states of Mexico...
...Fidel Veldsquez was the first organizational secretary of the CTM...
...The government has, however, con- tinued to viciously attack all efforts by workers to assert their rights, or to organize independent or democratic unions outside of state control...
...The government has enormous power to intervene in the labor movement, to arbitrarily dismiss union leaders, to declare strikes "ille- gal," to militarily seize workplaces, to grant or withhold legal recognition, and to delay the pro- ceedings by which workers can change union rep- resentation...
...To limit the power of the CTM and strengthen government control over the unions, Chrdenas oversaw the creation ofapart from the CTM-a mixed organization of farmworkers and small property owners called the National Confederation of Cooperatives (CNC), and an organization of public-sector workers, the Federation of Unions of Workers at the Service of the State (FSTSE...
...The PRI-CTM links are especially tight...
...Even more pernicious is the practice of 44NACIA REPORT ON THE AMERICAS NACIL REPORT ON THE AMERICAS 44REPORT ON MEXICO Unions Angle for Power in Mexico "protection contracts," whereby official unions sell companies a contract which remains in a drawer until such time as a real union appears on the scene...
...it mandated health and safety protections...
...Despite these enormous obstacles, a small, gen- uinely independent militant wing outside the PRI- controlled Congress of Labor has emerged...
...Moreover, recently the head of FESEBES, telephone workers' union president Her- nandez Jubrez, served as chief negotiator during the Volkswagen strike in 1992, which resulted in a devastating agreement...
...For example, FAT was a key founder and active partici- pant in the Mexican Action Network on Free Trade (RMALC), the coalition of over 100 Mexican organi- zations which opposed NAFTA...
...The pact between the Constitutionalist forces of Venustiano Carranza and the anarchist House of the Workers of the World was the beginning of what is rhetorically known in Mexico as the "historic relationship between the working class and the State...
...He made the CTM, CNC, and FSTSE official affiliates of the Mexican ruling party, the PRI...
...The Confederation of Mexican Workers (CTM) was founded in the 1930s...
...Article 123 of the new post-revolution Constitution enumerated a series of labor rights and protections: it guaranteed the right to organize unions and to strike...
...Bertha Lujan, one of FAT's three national officers, has announced that she will run as an independent women's candidate in the upcoming Congressional elections...
Vol. 28 • July 1994 • No. 1
