Mexican Labor News & Analysis

Mexico Faces Crisis: Economy Could Shrink

Mexico, like the rest of the world, faces an economic crisis, possibly a real depression. The situation appears to be worsening rapidly as it is elsewhere.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) declared in the first weeks of December that there is now a world economic crisis and that no country will escape its impact. The IMF projected that global economic growth in the coming year would be 2.2 percent.

But some believe that Mexico’s economy, the second biggest in Latin America after Brazil, will actually contract next year. Barclay’s Capital also foresees a decline in the Mexican GDP by 0.8 percent. Morgan Stanley in a report issued in early December, predicted that Mexico’s economy will shrink by 1.5 percent. Merrill Lynch & Co., however, see growth of 0.4 percent in Mexico in 2009, while the World Bank predicts growth of 1.1 percent. In any case, all the predictions are bleak, all mean increased unemployment and poverty for millions.

Surprisingly, Mexico also continues to suffer from inflation, which has increased by 6.23% in the last seven years, according to the Bank of Mexico.

ECLAC Report: Unemployment, Declining Wages

The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC/CEPAL) predicts: “As a result of the international crisis, employment is expected to stagnate during 2009 and real wages will remain unchanged or may decline slightly. Unemployment could rise, especially affecting the poorest population. The current trend already shows a greater concentration of unemployment among low income workers.” The announcement of the report, Social Panorama of Latin America 2008, states that “Economic forecasts suggest that average household incomes will deteriorate, particularly among independent and informal workers whose jobs are most sensitive to movement in economic cycles.”

ECLAC’s Director of Social Development, Martín Openhayn, explained that Mexico is more exposed than other Latin American countries because of its close ties to the United States. ECLAC reasserted “the need to create special public investment programs in infrastructure, extend unemployment insurance and strengthen financing, coverage and the institutional framework of conditional transfer programs.” [Social Panorama of Latin America 2008 – Summary in English.

The World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank together will offer Mexico about $5.5 billion in loans for 2009 to be used for infrastructure development and poverty programs.

Credit Crisis

Like other countries, Mexico has a credit crisis. Miguel Tijerina of the Mexican Credit Bureau says that every day 3,305 borrowers find themselves unable to pay their credit card bills and other consumer debt. Most of this, he says, is a result of credit card debt. Of 51.5 million accounts, some 5.15 million are in the red and unable to pay. Mexico’s total population is about 108.7 million people.

The country’s richest man, Carlos Slim, has called upon Mexican banks to reduce the credit card and mortgage interest rates. Taking his cue, the Mexican lower house voted to impose limits and Slim is said to be winning over the Senators to approve the measure as well.

El Barzón, the debtors’ union that played a big role in direct action against the banks in the crisis of the mid-1990s, has called for a meeting in Chihuahua to discuss how to respond to the current crisis.

Rising Unemployment

Manpower reported that while this year Mexico had created between 111,000 and 170,000 new jobs, next year it would lose 200,000. Mexico needs to create more than one million jobs each year to absorb new workers entering the job market. In addition to job losses in Mexico, the government is expecting hundreds of thousands of workers to return from the United States because they are now unable to find work there.

The auto industry’s problems will lead to worker layoffs in Mexico. General Motors Corp. (GM) announced that it will idle almost one-third of its North American assembly plant production in the first quarter because of the drop in sales. This decision affects 14 U.S. plants, three in Canada and three in Mexico.

To take just another example of the employment situation in Mexico, according to the National Chamber of the Clothing Industry, that industry has lost 36,000 jobs as 296 firms have closed. The industry expects to see another 10,000 jobs lost.

Workers Wages: Low and Falling

The crisis threatens to result in lower wages, but Bertha Luján, Secretary of Labor in the so-called “Legitimate Government” of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, says that Mexico’s workers have the lowest wages in all of Latin America already. Luján criticized the government and its National Minimum Wage Commission (CNSM) for what she called the “charade” of approving wage increases of no more than three percent. She noted that while annual wage increase have been about 8 percent, the basic shopping basket has risen 27 percent, meaning workers have fallen almost 20 percent behind.

According to Luján, Mexicans’ basic foods have risen dramatically: tortillas by 42 percent, milk by 53 percent, bread by 60 percent, beans by 100 percent, rice by 130 percent, and sugar by 40 percent. The price of gas has also risen by 12 percent. White corn, used for human consumption in Mexico, is expected to rise significantly in the coming year.

The Left Faces the Economic Crisis

President of the “Legitimate Government,” López Obrador has called upon his movement of peaceful civil resistance to reorient itself to fighting to protect the Mexican people during this economic crisis. He calls upon the Commission to raise wages by at least 7 percent.

With the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) and the Broad Progressive Front (FAP) both in crisis, López Obrador defines his as a broader movement from below. Speaking before audiences throughout the country, he calls upon that movement to fight for subsidies for fertilizer for farmers, for aid to single mothers and older adults, and for scholarships for students.

At the same time, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), the Workers Party (PT), and the PRD joined together to speak out in the House of Representatives and demand that Calderón change his economic policies.

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Drug Wars and Violence Continue—No End in Sight

Andrés Manuel López Obrador who calls himself the “Legitimate President of Mexico” observed recently that while Mexico is in last place in economic growth in Latin America, it is first in beheadings. That sums up the situation rather well. While the economy has been flagging, crime and violence have been flourishing.

The biggest obstacle to ending the violence is the corruption of the Mexican police forces. Top leaders in many different police agencies, including top officials of the Federal and state police assigned to the drug wars, have been arrested and charged with aiding the drug dealers.

Girl’s Kidnapping, Murder

At the moment, the Mexican media has focused the nation’s attention on the kidnapping and murder of the daughter of a wealthy and politically connected family. The body of Silvia Vargas Escalera, daughter of former cabinet minister Nelson Vargas, the country’s top sports official, was found more than a year after she was kidnapped. She disappeared in September 2007 and her body was not found until Dec. 5 of this year.

Her father had gone on television on the first anniversary of her disappearance to demand that the government do something to find here and punish her abductors. “We asked ourselves if the reason why no one wants to grab those who are guilty is because they are afraid that high-level authorities from the PFP, SIEDO, AFI would be linked, as has happened in other kidnapping and narco-trafficking cases,” Vargas said. The PFP are the Federal Preventive Police, SIEDO is the anti-drug unit, and the AFI is the Federal Agency of Investigation.

The Drug War in Bloody Statistics

Every day in Mexico, for several years now, there are reports of massacres, mass graves, beheadings, shoot-outs, murders and kidnappings. A local San Diego radio station created an interactive website to track the San Diego-Tijuana area drug wars (http://www.kpbs.org/borderbattle). The map, which shows those who have been shot, beaten, strangled, suffocated, or murdered, as well as multiple murders and kidnappings, represents only one part of the drug war battleground.

Eduardo Medina Mora, Mexico’s Attorney General, reported that in the last year the number of drug war killings had more than doubled. This year, he reported, there have been 5,376, compared to 2,477 last year. Most of the killings have taken place along the border in cities like Tijuana and Ciudad Juarez and in northern states such as Sinaloa. In total, since the election of President Felipe Calderón there have been 8,150 killings in the drug wars.

The government has arrested 34,593 members of the four major drug cartels, out of a total of 52,688 arrests altogether during the anti-drug operations. Along the way the government has seized 15,409 weapons (not including handguns), 3.7 rounds of ammunition, 2,040 grenades and 70 tons of cocaine. While some praise the Calderón government for its efforts (see for example Stratfor). The government has proven incapable of breaking the drug dealers.

In the course of the struggle, drug dealers have killed hundreds of police officers and 25 reporters or news broadcasters.

The government also continues to deal with the problem of kidnappings. Between 1997 and 2008 there have been 7,395 kidnappings.

U.S. Government to Help Finance Mexico’s Drug War

President Felipe Calderón has spent US$7 billion on the drug wars during the last three years, while dispatching 36,000 troops to border states and other areas of the country. The military involvement has resulted in widespread accusations of civil rights violations.

In early December, the United States government contributed US$197 million to pay for helicopters and other equipment, the first part of the Merida Plan payments. Another $US136 million is to follow almost immediately. The U.S. Congress first approved the US$465 million for drug wars in Mexico and Central America in June. This represents the first installment of some $1.4 billion promised by U.S. President George W. Bush when he visited Merida, Mexico in March 2007.

Robert S. Mueller, head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) met with Mexican Attorney General Medina Mora in the second week of December to coordinate joint actions against drug dealers. Antonio Garza, the U.S. Ambassador to Mexico, said that cooperation between the two countries would reach from the highest levels to agents in the field. He called upon the two countries to be partners in the war against the drug dealers who operate on both sides of the border. The U.S. government has been increasingly concerned that not only drugs cross the border, but now also the conflicts between the drug cartels, leading to kidnappings and killings in the U.S.

Mexico’s drug dealers, businessmen engaged in contraband, bring enormous wealth into the country, but they also cause tremendous problems of crime, violence, and corruption. The government’s war against them, however, also has many impacts on both society and the social movements. It strengthens the power of the police and the Army and leads to human rights abuses. It sucks up billions of dollars in resources that might be used for economic and social development. It involves widespread violence in which thousands are dying. It discourages foreign investment and tourism. And, since it is not being won, it has also led the drug dealers to militarize their organizations, as has the government.

The Mexican government’s inability so far to win the war and the continued ramping up of resources to fight it tend to project a foreseeable future of more kidnappings, murder, and massacres. While the left’s call for greater investment in economic and social infrastructures—jobs, education, health—makes sense as a general social policy, the left has no credible independent program to get rid of the cartels.

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Conflict between Miners and Government Intensifies

The conflict between the Mexican Miners and Metal Workers Union (SNTMMRM) and the Mexican government has intensified over recent months. The Mine Workers Union attributes the change to the new Mexican Minister of the Interior, Fernando Gómez Mont who also doubles as an attorney for the Grupo Mexico mining company.

The government had carried out a two-pronged attack on the union involving arresting of some of its Most important leaders and declaring its principal strike to be illegal. The Mexican authorities arrested Juan Linares Montúfar, the head of the unions council of vigilance and justice, and the unions secretary of political affairs, Carlos Pavón Campos. Linares Monufar is charged with defrauding union members of US$55 million and Pavón Campos of defrauding members of MX$9.47 million.

The union’s top officer, general secretary Napoleón Gómez Urrutia, was similarly charged with defrauding the union of US$55 million. He had previously fled to Vancouver, Canada, and leads the union from there. The Mine Workers Union leaders have denied the charges and independent investigations sponsored by other labor organizations have found the charges to be unsubstantiated. The International Metalworkers Federation (IMF) and the United Steel Workers of Canada and the United States continue to support the Mexican Mine Workers Union and its leadership. The Brazilian Metal Workers union (CNM/CUT) issued a statement in support of the Mexican Mine Workers Union.

Pavón Campos told the press, “The weight of the government, which has me and Juan Linarees Montúfar, another member of our union executive committee in jail, is the weight of the money of the owners of Grupo Mexico and Altos Hornos [mining and metal companies] which are willing to pay whatever is necessary to get rid of the union.” He was released on a 5.6 million peso bond in mid-December.

Cananea Strike Declared Illegal

The government’s other strategy involved breaking the miners’ strikes. For the fourth time the Labor Board (JFCA) declared the Cananea strike to be illegal (inexistente). Labor lawyer Arturo Alcalde Justiniani called the Labor Board’s decision “a grotesque act.” “This is proof,” he said, “that the Federal government is putting all of its resources and forces up against the union in order to destroy it, and to do so it is also using the mass media.”

However no sooner did the Labor Board deliver its decision than a federal court issued an injunction against it, permitting the strike to continue. The union leadership vowed it would do so.

Napoleón Gómez Urrutia Calls for Justice

Gómez Urrutia, speaking from Canada, called upon president Felipe Calderón to personally look into and attend to the issues of the Mine Workers Union and not to believe the lies that were being brought to his desk.” He also called upon Mexico’s mine workers to continue the fight to control their own union and to prevent its destruction by Grupo Mexico and the government.

“Without vanity or boasting,” said Gómez Urrutia, “we declare that in the recent history of Mexico and in the world, there has been no struggle more important than that which we are carrying for on workers’ rights, for legality, and for justice in labor relations.

In his message to miners and other groups of workers who gathered to support them he continued, “This commits us even more to the country, to society and to the working class, and to history. It commits us to our brother electricians, university workers, streetcar drivers, petroleum workers, service workers, as well as farmers and shop keepers, gathered together in the federations to which they belong.”

Solidarity with the Miners

As pressure on the Mine Workers Union has increased, so has union solidarity. The Mexican Union Front (FSM), the National Union of Workers (UNT), and the National Coordinating Committee of the Teachers Union (la CNTE) have all come to the support of the miners, turning out in large numbers for protest demonstrations in Mexico City and in Zacatecas.

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Teachers’ Opposition Movement Prepares Alternative Plan

Mexican teachers, members of the opposition National Coordinating Committee (la CNTE) of the Mexican Teachers Union (el SNTE) have for months been engaged in strikes, marches and other protests against the Alliance for Quality Education (ACE), a reform program adopted by the government and the union. In Guerrero and Michoacan, for example, they have taken blocked highways or taken over toll stations. The protests in several states have been large, militant and in some cases have led to violent repression by the authorities.

Now, for the first time, the teacher reform movement is working on its own alternative to the ACE program. For decades la CNTE has fought principally for two objectives, local control of the unions and higher wages for teachers. The development of a vision and plan for educational reform will represent an important step for the movement.

Foundations of an Alternative

Representatives of la CNTE from the Distrito Federal, Guerrero, Michoacán, Puebla, Tlaxcala, Querétaro, and the Valley of Mexico are currently working to draft the document. The draft reportedly calls for the integral and well-rounded development of all students, but also the inculcation of values of social solidarity. It also calls for continuing the normal schools, some of which the government has threatened to close, with expanding democracy in education, using the public media, and raising teacher pay and funding for schools.

If la CNTE succeeds in producing an educational reform document that can inspire teachers, parents, students and the public, it will represent a significant step in creating an alternative to the bureaucratic and commercial vision of the government and the union leadership. It will be awaited with great anticipation.

Senate Demands Accounting

In other developments, the Mexican Senate has asked for an accounting of the funds that the Secretary of Public Education (SEP) makes available to the Mexican Teachers Union (el SNTE). The fund reportedly amounts to as much as 100 billion pesos. Graco Ramírez, a Senator from the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), says that the Secretary of Finance figures do not agree with those of the SEP. Other Senators have questions as well.

In Mexico City, members of Local 9 of el SNTE, frustrated with both the SEP and the SNTE, report that they are “exploring the idea of creating an independent union” in order to escape the control of Elba Esther Gordillo, the head of the teachers union.

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Oil Workers Protest Government Approval of Leadership

Petroleum workers from ten locals formally protested the government’s approval of the union’s highest officer, General Secretary Carlos Roberto Deschamps, through the regular legal process known as “toma de nota” or “taking note.” In Mexico, unions must not only register their leaders with the government, but the government must approve of those union leaders through this process. Oil workers argue that Deschamps’ election violated union statutes.

Oil worker Omar Toledo Aburto, who has maintained a permanent sit-in in front of the Secretary of Labor’s office, argues that the union conventions and local meetings that elected Deschamps did not have a quorum, and that it was never verified that those present were actually union members. Nor, he says, was official notice of the nominations given in advance. Finally, he and other members claim, Deschamps both headed up the union executive board which functions as elections committee, while at the same time standing as candidate for office—a clear conflict of interest.

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IMSS Workers Claim that they are being Harassed

Confidential employees of the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS) who a little more than a year ago formed a labor union, the National Coalition of Confidential Employees of IMSS, claim that they are being harassed. According to the workers, Carolina Gómez Vinales, head of a program called IMSS Opportunities, has been working to undermine their organization.

IMSS Opportunities has over 11 thousand regular employees and over 2,400 confidential employees. Confidential employees are so called because though not managers themselves, they work closely with management. IMSS also has casual employees who themselves do not qualify for the IMSS health services.

The National Coalition’s general secretary, Victor Hugo Sánchez Santana, says that the union was formed largely to protect workers who give services to isolated socially and economically disadvantaged communities. He says that the Coalition will seek official recognition from the Secretary of Labor and attempt to affiliate other similar employees to strengthen the organization.

Sánchez said his organization would like the support of the National Union of Workers, but its largest affiliate, the National Union of Social Security Workers, has been hostile to the creation of another union among IMSS employees.

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Woman Activist Wins National Human Rights Prize

Esther Chávez Cano, a woman activist from Ciudad Juárez, was awarded Mexico’s National Human Rights Award on December 11 by President Felipe Calderón. “Her brave work in denouncing the crimes was key to awakening society, the authorities, public opinion and the entire world to the cases of violence against women in Ciudad Juarez,” said the president. Chávez Cano is the founder of Casa Amiga, a center which both helps the victims’ families and works to end such killings.

During the last 15 years, hundreds of young women have been killed in Ciudad Juárez, and while the authorities have arrested and convicted some individuals, accounting, they say, for 80 percent of the crimes, no one believes that the crimes have been entirely solved and everyone is aware that they continue. The killings began with the murder of 100 women in 1993 and continue, though since 2005 they have diminished.

“Phenomena of extreme brutality define every day life in my city,” said Chávez. “While these phenomena are not limited to the border, they appear there with particular crudeness, and, it would seem, without any hope of being eradicated. “The state attorneys, with the proper investigations and punishment of these crimes would never be able to get to their causes which are the result of social inequality, economic insecurity, educational exclusion, and the lack of a culture of equality.”

[For other information on Esther Chávez and the Ciudad Juárez killings of women see:
An interview with Esther Chávez from 2004;
Information on Casa Amiga, A.C.;
PBS’s POV broadcast the flim “Señorita Extraviada” (Missing Girl) dealing with the killings;
Dan La Botz, “Girl's Murder Sad Symbol of Corporate Power, Child Labor, Female Exploitation on the Border,” Mexican Labor News and Analysis, March 2nd, 1999, republished by Corp Watch;
A bibliography on the killings.

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CTM Foresees No Problem with Christmas Bonuses

Patricio Flores Sandoval, a member of the Mexican House of Representatives and a spokesman for the Confederation of Mexican Workers (CTM) says that so far there have been no problems with aguinaldos, the Christmas bonuses which represent a substantial portion of the pay of Mexican workers. Bonuses are due by December 20.

Under the law, companies are required to pay the bonuses to both private and public employees. Workers for private companies must be paid at least 15 days pay, though some employers pay between 15 and 30. Public employees receive 40 days pay, part in cash and part in coupons. An estimated 20 million workers receive these bonuses. The total this year is estimated to be some 63 billion pesos.

Flores Sandoval said that only about 15 to 20 percent of workers use these bonuses for Christmas gifts, most of the money going to pay for living expenses and domestic purchases.

He commented that in states where the economy is in bad shape and layoffs are taking place—Chihuahua, Nuevo Leon, and Tamaulipas, for example—workers would receive their severance pay and Christmas bonus as the same time.

The CTM estimates that there are another 20 million workers in the informal economy who consequently will receive no aguinaldo.

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Pain and Protest on the Day of the Butterflies: Violence Persists Against Women in Mexico

Reprinted from: Americas Policy Program Report

Frontera NorteSur | December 2, 2008

A 1995 novel by writer Julia Alvarez retold the story of the three Mirabal sisters brutally assassinated by the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic in 1960. Decades later, the date of the murders, Nov. 25, was declared the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women by the United Nations.

In Mexico, more than 200 women's and human rights activists kicked off a cross-country caravan in Ciudad Juarez to protest femicide and ongoing violence in all its forms against women.

Initiating their action at the monument to murdered women situated at the foot of the Santa Fe Bridge on the Mexico-U.S. border, the women's activists embarked on a week-long journey to the state of Chiapas on Mexico's southern border. Along the route, caravan participants plan to meet with the widows of the Pasta de Concho miners killed in 2006, as well as survivors of violent government crackdowns in San Salvador Atenco and Oaxaca the same year. A meeting was also scheduled with Chihuahua Governor Jose Reyes Baeza.

For many, beginning the caravan in Ciudad Juarez, the site of more than 600 women's murders since 1993, held both symbolic and urgent meaning. Dr. Julia Monarrez Fragoso, a researcher with Colegio de la Frontera Norte in Ciudad Juarez, said the rape-murders of young women in Ciudad Juarez has become one element of a violent social storm that is now claiming the lives of large numbers of men. Spawned by organized crime and weak government, massive violence has rendered civil society "scared, terrorized, and in need of truth and justice," said the women's rights advocate.

"The number (of victims) is alarming and we shouldn't say it's just a war between narcos," Monarrez said, "because in the final analysis, they are human beings and there should be a State that rules a city and takes care of the safety of its inhabitants. That's why there are laws."

On Nov. 25, nearly 20 people, mostly men, were reported murdered in Ciudad Juarez. The incidents included the apparent firing-squad style execution of seven men whose bodies were found outside a high school, and the slaying of a man and his son in front of hundreds of middle school students. Local press accounts report the murders of more than 1,400 people in Ciudad Juarez so far this year.
Even as activists prepared to launch the Chihuahua-Chiapas caravan, the number of female homicide victims kept mounting in Ciudad Juarez and other parts of the state of Chihuahua. For instance, in a period of less than 24 hours Nov. 20-21, five women were killed in Ciudad Juarez in gangland-style slayings.
Two other victims of violent death were recently discovered outside Chihuahua City and near the north-central city of Cuauhtemoc, respectively. In the first incident, an unidentified woman was found dead on a highway where the bodies of previous femicide victims have been recovered, and in the second case, 14-year-old Gabriela Ivonne Valdiviezo Majalca was found naked with her throat slashed on Nov. 23. Valdiviezo had last been seen alive at a dance party attended by her parents and others.

In Ciudad Juarez, approximately 700 women have been murdered since 1993, the first year large-scale killings of women came to public light. Dozens of other women and young girls remain disappeared. Two adolescents, 14-year-old Iveth Rocio Hernandez Cuellar and 17-year-old Hortensia Areli Rojas Romo, are the latest publicly-known cases. Both teenagers were reported missing from the same Ciudad Juarez neighborhood on Nov.18.

Meanwhile, a new report by a Mexican network of non-governmental activists dedicated to monitoring official responses to violence against women, documented the killings of 1,014 women in 13 Mexican states from January 2007 to July 2008. With 206 slain women, Chihuahua was ranked second in the overall number of women slain, behind the much more populous state of Mexico. According to the study by the OCNF network, 8,100 women were murdered in Mexico from the end of 2000 to the mid-summer of 2008.

On the broader issue of gender and domestic violence, the official Chihuahua Women's Institute reported attending 3,353 people who sought professional help to escape violent situations between the months of January and August of this year. Among the solicitants were 103 men.

In a statement prepared for the Nov. 25 commemoration, Amnesty International Secretary General Irene Khan credited the UN Security Council as well as national governments for according increased recognition to the problem of violence against women since the international human rights group launched a global campaign around the issue in 2003-2004. The Ciudad Juarez and Chihuahua City femicides were an early part of Amnesty's campaign.
Still, gender violence in Mexico and many other parts of the globe is "endemic," Khan contended, with issues of war, economics, and social development all mixed into the package.

Khan wrote that, "Recent research in Afghanistan, Armenia, Canada, Cote D'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Jamaica, Haiti, Liberia, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Venezuela, and the USA has shown that this violence is not only a human rights violation but also a key factor in obstructing the realization of women's and girl's rights to security, adequate housing, health, food, education, and participation. Millions of women find themselves locked in cycles of poverty and violence, cycles which fuel and perpetuate one another."

In a Nov. 25 communiqué, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay condemned the systematic violence against women in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, but noted "violence continues being a huge problem suffered by thousands of women in the whole world." The UN official urged governments to put into practice international resolutions on gender equality that were adopted at the 1995 Beijing Conference and by the 1979 Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.

Frontera NorteSur (FNS): on-line, U.S.-Mexico border news from the Center for Latin American and Border Studies New Mexico State University in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

To reprint this article, please contact americas@ciponline.org The opinions expressed here are the author's and do not necessarily represent the views of the CIP Americas Policy Program or the Center for International Policy.

Sources

Lapolaka.com, November 25, 2008.
El Heraldo de Chihuahua, November 25, 2008.
Commondreams.org, November 25, 2008. Article by Irene Khan.
Norte, November 20, 22 and 25, 2008. Articles by Nohemi Barraz and editorial staff.
La Jornada, November 25, 2008. Articles by Victor Ballinas, Miroslava Breach, Ruben Villalpando, Octavio Velez, and news services.
Cimacnoticias.com, November 24, 2008. Article by Lourdes Godinez Leal.

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International Solidarity for Republic Workers

On Friday, December 5, 2008, an new chapter in labor history was written by about 260 Chicago workers at Republic Windows and Doors.

Three days earlier, they learned the plant was closing. Bank of America, although flush with U.S. government bailout cash, had refused to extend Republic's line of credit and had also refused to allow Republic to pay out what they were owed.

United — as a union of co-workers — they stood together and said "No!"

For the next five days they occupied their plant — something rarely seen in the U.S. since the 1930's The worldwide reaction was stunning.

A World of Support

People organized demonstrations in dozens of cities across the country, from New York to San Francisco, from icy Buffalo to sunny Florida. Solidarity messages poured in from around the world. Their common theme was, "We're behind you — and proud of you! Keep up the fight!"

From three continents, some of UE’s strong allies sent letters. The Mexican Authentic Workers Front (FAT) wrote: “The brothers and sisters who are activists in the FAT wish to express our recognition and admiration for your brave decision to occupy the plant in order to claim your most fundamental rights. We are sure that you will be an example and inspiration for many workers who today are confronting discharges, temporary shutdowns and even more drastic plant closures as a product of the economic crisis we did not provoke, but for which we are paying the consequences.”

The very important action you have taken serves to underscore that the policies of the governments is to rescue large companies from the crisis while abandoning their obligations for the well-being of workers.”

Zenroren weighed in on behalf of its 1.2 million members in Japan: “Your fight is “our fight” as millions of workers around the world are suffering from the economic crisis that affects more and more people every day. Though we have great distance over the Pacific Ocean, Zenroren firmly stands with you.”

From Europe, the CGT added their voice: “On behalf of… the oldest and biggest French Labor federation, we are writing to exptress our support with your legitimate struggle…. YOUR FIGHT IS OUR FIGHT as millions of workers in America and France as well are suffereing from the economic crisis that affects more and more people everyday…. Keep up the fight – be sure that the workers of France are with you!

The UE Local 1110 members had no way of knowing how deeply their courageous action would resonate. But it soon became clear that their action articulated the anger and frustration of millions of ordinary people in this worsening economic crisis.
A World of Hope

They inspired people fed up by the excesses of banks, corporations and the powerful who have led us into the worst economic crisis since the 1930s — and then got the government to bail them out with our money.

They gave hope to people who face the prospect of losing jobs, homes, healthcare, retirement, and for many, the hope for their kids to get a good college education.
A Movement to 'Resist Economic Violence'

Rev. Jesse Jackson expressed it well when he said that, like Rosa Parks 50 years ago, the Republic workers stood up for justice by sitting down. “In many ways,” said Jackson, their action “is the beginning of a larger movement for mass action to resist economic violence.”

Now, it's up to all of us to make sure this moment is a real turning point, when we begin to stand together as working people to demand an economy and government policies that put our needs first.

For more information, go to the UE web site

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Labor Shorts

According to Bloomberg, General Moters may increase production at a new assembly plant in San Luis Potosi, Mexico to take advantage of rising demand for exports. Gustavo Cespedes, soon to be appointed as the plant’s chief was quoted by reporter Thomas Black as saying: “We’re evaluating all this. In the next few weeks, we should have a clearer picture for all the operations, not only for San Luis.”

The article reported that Mexican auto exports have continued to rise this year even with slack U.S. demand. Mexico’s exports from January to October rose 5.8 percent to 1.81 million autos.

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Book Review: Illegal People - How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants

Review by Richard Leitch, a trade union activist and writer from England

Illegal People - How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants David Bacon(Beacon Press 2008) David Bacon’s third book on migrant labour in the modern economy extends his previous focus on Latino immigration in the US to consider its global dimensions. Combining his signature of personal testimonies allied to politically informed analysis, he shows us that the two topics of globalisation and migrant labour are intimately related. For it is the neo-liberal globalisation agenda pursued by leading capitalist powers (and the institutions they control) that destroys existing livelihoods, uprooting peoples, who are then set in motion within ever increasing migrant flows. As immigrants in the rich countries, these migrants find themselves socially and politically marginalised: confined to low grade exploitable labour, without rights to organise, denied citizenship and facing manifold discrimination. They are the ‘illegal people’, but their illegality is one that has been created by the global economic and political system. Bacon argues the best political solution is not to confine migrants within second class ‘guest worker’ programmes (the preference of corporations and Western governments), but to press ahead and secure full social and political rights for all working people.

The book opens with two dispatches from the front lines of immigration battles in the US – detailing federal workplace raids on employers using undocumented labour in California and North Carolina. In both cases the crackdowns were targeted at sites where migrant labour had been fighting back through union organising and campaigning. Working here was transformed into a crime, punishable by interrogation, imprisonment and loss of employment on the part of those deemed illegal. In the process, collective efforts to improve conditions for migrant labour were derailed.

As for these migrant communities themselves, their very presence in the US is a direct consequence of economic displacement and associated political upheavals in Central America. Bacon focuses on conditions in two regions of Mexico – Oaxaca and Cananea – showing how neo-liberal reforms under NAFTA destroyed farm livelihoods and state supports for production and consumption, leaving masses of people with no choice but to migrate northwards. He insists the two processes of displacement and migration are part of a single global economic system, trade and immigration policies working together to create and then utilise a mass of vulnerable and exploitable labour.

There are now an estimated 12 million undocumented people in the US, 6 million Mexicans crossing the border since Nafta came into force in 1994. Their labour has become a central support for the whole US economy, especially in agricultural, food processing and service industries. They perform the worst jobs for low pay (thereby holding down the overall level of wages), contribute taxes but are allowed to claim no benefits, are used as a buffer to cope with shifting economic conditions (and able to be deported if losing employment), and cover their own costs of social reproduction.

However this undeniable and growing economic contribution to USA plc has not brought with it accompanying social and political rights for migrant workers and their communities. In the second part of his book Bacon surveys the political battles around immigration and its reform in the US, which turns on the issues of what status and rights can be claimed by its migrant masses.

The option favoured by corporate and mainstream political parties is that of a ‘guest worker’ programme, granting temporary residence tied to work visas and employment only, reinforced by strong enforcement measures and a limited legalisation for existing undocumented labour.

Looking at the historical record of such programmes (especially the Bracero regime of the mid twentieth century), and their smaller scale equivalents today (the H2 programmes in agricultural and assembly manufacture) Bacon shows us there is no real future here. Instead a large body of evidence exists documenting the appalling conditions facing those employed in this way: low pay, long hours, tied housing, health and safety violations, repression of worker protests, firing of activists and employer blacklists. As Cesar Chavez, UFW founder pointed out, the Bracero regime inhibited workers organisation and their attainment of better pay and conditions. Obviously this is why it remains the corporate preference today.

Alternatives pressing for greater rights for migrant workers have emerged in the US labour and immigrant rights movements, and Bacon looks at a number of these. Grassroots efforts to organise migrant day labourers in non traditional settings of street corners and community sites, found in the megacities of LA and NYC, have had some success. From here a national day labourers’ body has emerged and begun working with established trade unions. Bacon speculates that the increasing casualisation of the workforce will require more in the way of such non traditional forms of organising.

The unions themselves eventually recognised the significance and weight of migrant labour in the US economy, and swung behind organising for immigrant rights, a process that has also allowed them to draw upon the traditions of political resistance migrant workers carry with them from their lands of origin. (Bacon’s earlier two books, The Children of Nafta and Communities without Borders drew our attention to such a fertilisation). At best, unions have supported calls for an amnesty for the undocumented, opening up the prospect of a new mass movement uniting labour and community organs. However the later split of AFL-CIO fractured this possibility, the breakaway ‘Change to Win’ coalition moving over to the ‘guest worker’ option, leaving organised labour without a common programme for immigration reform.

There are further considerations that progressives need to take on board. Bacon argues immigration reform must be pursued within a larger project of establishing a common programme of jobs and rights for all working people – Latino, Afro-American, Asian, white – to prevent division and competition between these groups in their fight against existing inequalities. In the southern states he finds promising examples of this expansive strategy. MIRA, the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance, has responded to the influx of migrant labour and guest worker programmes associated with post –Katrina reconstruction with workplace organising amongst migrant construction crews and legislative alliances to overturn anti-immigrant bills at state level.

Nationally the Black Caucus in Congress has delivered wide-ranging proposals for immigration reform that attach job creation programmes for Afro-American communities to legalisation of the undocumented and workplace rights for all. Through such initiatives, progressive immigration reform proposals are coming to national attention – amplified to be sure by the massive immigrant rights protests of 2003 and 2006. However as he cautions, their future depends upon the movement growing stronger and uniting around a common platform.

In the third part of ‘Illegal People’ Bacon broadens his scope to foreground the global dimension of migration, both historically and today. His discussion of the role Filipino labour has played in the US economy makes the important point that its inferior status was inherited at root from the slave foundations of US society which clearly divided people between the categories of legal citizen and illegal alien, with the associated right to work, on racial grounds.

US immigration policy still models itself today on these barbaric foundations. A potential political link is however clearly established here between Afro-American communities and today’s ‘illegal peoples’ in terms of their search for citizenship and full socioeconomic rights.

Globally some 180 million people now live and work outside their country of origin, struggling against conditions similar to those Bacon has described in the US, to break out of an assigned illegal status or the restrictions of guest worker programmes and claim social and political rights: Turks in Germany, Algerians in France, Iraqis in Britain. At the level of global politics, whilst the WTO advocates a managed migration programme on a global scale to keep these masses confined, Bacon notes that a UN International Convention on migrant workers and their families of 1990 offers them a real future. It promises security and rights for both documented and undocumented labour, in respect of employment, education, family reunification and safeguards against collective deportation. This goes far beyond the current legal/illegal division that economic and political elites use to restrict migrant labour. In Bacon’s view, such distinctions only preserve existing inequalities.

The book ends with a look at the ‘transnational’ character of today’s migrant communities and their demands for a new model of citizenship. Migrant streams flowing from parts of Africa, Asia and Central America to the US and Europe are retaining strong ties to their lands of origin, creating in effect a transnational dimension to their communities – simultaneously in Oaxaca and California. They are calling for citizenship rights in both locations, against their exclusion from the economic and political life of the countries they settle in. Bacon cites the example of the Oaxacan ‘Indigenous Front of Binational Organisations’ (FIOB), to illustrate this feature, and their campaigns against guest worker programmes in the US coupled with on-going participation in Oaxacan village life.

US electoral politics however continues to deny representation to undocumented and transient migrant communities. Yet their demands for employment rights, the ability to organise, decent homes, education and healthcare are ones that all working people could benefit from. Without the electoral participation of these millions the positive agenda they support will be less likely to be achieved: legalisation is therefore an immigration reform that all workers should support, for with citizenship brings extra weight in favour of social change.

Bacon argues immigration reform now has to be part of such a larger common programme that can provide security, rights and equality for all. This must tackle not only the consequences of mass migration but challenge the very neo-liberal economic policies that put masses in motion in the first place. At its widest a real progressive alternative to today’s global order has to promote a range of global solidarities, challenging Western trade and associated military interventions, support workers’ organisation overseas, and secure freedom of movement for peoples beyond the narrow confines of corporate agendas. Bacon concludes that our common needs for jobs, social and political rights and freedom of movement will provide the platform on which such a campaign can be built. The old slogan ‘Workers of the world unite’ acquires here a concrete agenda we can all support.

Additional reviews

A Few Bad Apples...Or a Rotten System?
Laura Carlsen | December 12, 2008
Editor: Emily Schwartz Greco


Review: Illegal People
Mary Bauer | December 10, 2008
Editor: Emily Schwartz Greco


These respond to an earlier review of "Illegal People - How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants" (Beacon Press, 2008)
All three are available on the website for Foreign Policy in Focus.

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