The attendance of the Australian participants was ‘patchy’, usually because of personal, family commitments. No single session produced a full complement of participants. Sadly, the last session had to be abandoned after the second attempt – 3 of the participants were involved directly in industrial disputes, 2 more had prior personal commitments.

However, every participant commented at regular intervals that the program was very important to them and that it had added significantly to their understanding of what was happening to Australian society and other countries in the region. Further, they felt able, often for the first time, to describe and discuss globalisation with other workers and with their colleagues in the union office. To some extent the course has helped the participants to conceive of a more relevant response in their day to day work as union representatives. It is unclear at this stage how much a different response can be translated into practical effect.

There are ongoing discussions with the participants and others in their unions about the strengths and weaknesses of the ISC initiative.

I located participants by making an official approach to key people in the NSW or National offices of a number of unions. They then endorsed discussions and decisions to seek participants from within their organisation and, in some cases, ensure that people were informed of the program and encouraged to attend. I wonder though that if I sought participants from outside of the official channels I would have found people who would have been keen to attend and who could have committed themselves more consistently. One participant has encouraged a more open approach to publicising the opportunity to take part in the program.

In general the overall structure of the course seemed to work well: opening with introductions / getting to know each other and participants learning from each other about their experiences of change and how globalisation fits in with these changes; then successively through the causes / forces / instruments behind globalisation and the impact of it on the lives of workers, the impact on unions and the responses which unions might develop.

It may be worth considering a different sequence to the sessions. For example, if there are a number of participants from the study circles who identify in the first and second sessions the problem of downsizing or closure of an operation and the impact on workers, it should be possible to introduce "union responses" into the subsequent session. In fact, it might be possible to redesign the sequence so that this happens in a deliberate way, rather than contingently.

The pattern for each session of the program was quite challenging.

• read reports from other countries;
• discuss the new topic for the session and its associated reading, using the prepared questions as a trigger;
• prepare our report on the outcome of this for distribution to other countries;
• hand out the optional additional reading and focus participants on the topic for the next session;
• then, after the session, write up the report and send it;

The reports from other countries were most useful and stimulating for the Australian participants, attracting a lot of discussion and a strong desire for a lot more. (see below) However, the need to read through the reports from other countries in the session was also time consuming and tended to restrict the capacity to move to the next topic. As the facilitator, I often found it challenging to manage this transition from country reports to the next topic, especially if the next topic required some focus on reading inside the session.

The reading load within each session tended to be excessive.

I think it is worth considering whether the reading material for each session (apart from the country reports) might be distributed before the session starts.

"Notes for the Facilitator" were also useful and pitched appropriately.

There were 3 sources of education materials: the experiences of the participants; the reading, both country reports and course material; the discussion which linked all of these sources as guided by the conceptual frameworks implied or directly suggested.

Most of the materials were in text and dialogue form. We should explore the potential for video material, charts etc.

One participant thought that the materials and discussion around the definition of globalisation could have been more thorough.

We had several very exciting discussions. Two are worth comment.

1. In the second session it became very clear to the Australian participants that their experiences of change in recent years were very similar to those in the other participating countries. The trends were the same although there are of course differences in the intensity and pace of neoliberalism and also the methods and primary actors. The Australian participants were ‘shocked’ by this comparison. I have not seen this impact as powerful as it occurred when the Australian participants read and discussed the words from the participants in the other study circles (apart from the few who are able to visit other countries and / or meet union representatives who are visiting Australia.)
2. In the fifth session we were able to discuss the experience of our Nestle participant who was facing the company’s proposal to down size the work force. This situation was very stressful for her and her work mates, and it brought out the very best in the rest of the participants. They rallied to discuss with her how resistance might be built and, in the process, began to use some of the analytical tools which were the essence of this program. Several have commented on how exciting this discussion was. Sadly, the pace of events in this struggle was already such that the ideas were not to be developed in the real world.

Both of these examples illustrate the potential of the program to generate new learning which might sustain experienced and new activists in the future.

Regarding the second incident described briefly above, it sets me wondering whether 2 or 3 scenarios like ‘down sizing’, ‘outsourcing’, might be introduced in an early session – if possible from out of the immediate or near immediate experience of participants – and then more of the study program be built around, "What are the causes of the situation? What’s wrong or bad about it? Who loses? Who gains? What can unions / workers do about it? What sort of strength is necessary to win against such a proposal? How might this strength be built?" It is possible that this approach might detract from the current program’s objective of developing a global view and analysis of the era of ‘globalisation’.

To what extent is it possible for contact points for participants to be exchanged early in the program? Union office fax, phone and email numbers would probably be sufficient.

In Australia it might be feasible to conduct the sessions in a computer lab with online fax and email capability? How feasible is this for other participating countries?

For the Australian facilitator, the web site was an outstanding resource. I hope we can maintain and develop the library facility. Already there are other activists who are showing an interest in the web site for their own self-managed, self-paced introduction to globalisation.

In the Australian group, we had 2 officials and 2 delegates who were experienced users of the internet. For the rest, the internet as a tool in the program seemed to be regarded as some other aspect which they could have nothing to do with. At times I wondered whether we had two sub groups in the discussion: one group which would use internet language and references in its observations and refelections, and another group who just politely shook their heads when they listened.