Elizabeth Tang attended the seminar from the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (HKCTU). In this article, she outlines their perspective on globalisation in the Asian region.

Globalisation: Its effects on Asian people

Workers in most Asian countries have felt the effects of globalisation much more than their counterparts elsewhere. Indeed some have claimed that if "any region is a test case for establishment claims about globalisation it is East Asia and its newly industrialising countries – South Korea, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Taiwan in particular." Despite all the hype about mobile capital, East Asia is the destination of more than half of all investment flows to developing countries.

In this region, the unrestricted free-flow of capital and the ever-increasing control of corporate power have gradually subordinated various aspect of social life and the environment to private profit. The Asian economic crisis highlights this dilemma. The loss of tens of millions of jobs, rapidly declining real wages, increased poverty, and the destruction of the livelihood of hundreds of millions of workers throughout the region was clearly the result of excessive corporate power and the unrestrained drive for profit.

After the crisis, instead of introducing capital controls and restricting speculative capital, governments claim that they need large reserves to fend off currency speculators. This is used to justify cuts in spending. Worst still were the dictates from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) which came to ‘rescue’ the economies from the crisis. They included cuts in food and fuel subsidies for Indonesian people and the introduction of massive layoff legislation for Korean workers. This undermined further the daily struggle of workers and their families to maintain their livelihood.

The response of unions

Any labour movement strategies for responding to globalisation must be assessed in terms of whether or not they shift the balance in favour of greater popular democratic control, and less corporate control. Globalisation is inevitable. But the present kind of globalisation is clearly masterminded by corporate power and governments who ally with them. Democratic labour organisations have to oppose this neo-liberal model of globalisation which has brought destruction to many gains the labour movement has made so far. Some organisations have already taken the lead.

Anti-Privatisation Struggles

Workers in Asia have demonstrated their resistance to government strategy to cut the national budget and spending. On May 23, 1999 the largest-ever workers’ demonstration was held in Hong Kong. Twenty-three thousand public sector workers and trade unionists protested against lay-offs, wage cuts, reduced pensions and diminished job security. This protest was in response to government plans for the privatisation of public services and restructuring of government departments which would affect the employment conditions of 189 thousand public sector workers.

This is only one demonstration among hundreds of strikes and demonstrations involving hundreds of thousands of workers throughout Asia in the last two years. In Taiwan, India, Thailand, Indonesia, South Korea, the Hong Kong SAR, and many other countries in the region, there has been organised opposition to privatisation and the increased corporate control which this process involves. Asserting "people over profit" in the struggle to protect public services and utilities from privatisation, public sector workers are not only defending their jobs. They are demanding that government spending be directed to meeting people’s needs.

Protests against job losses

Jobs have been seriously threatened as corporations employ various cost-cutting measures in workplaces resulting in wage cuts and job casualisation. Gradually job losses are treated as inevitable in the process of globalisation. In mass protests in China involving tens of thousands of workers, and thousands of workers in countries such as Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines, "the right to work" is demanded as a basic right.

At the extraordinary convention of the Korean KCTU in February 1998, delegates voted to reject the tripartite accord signed by the KCTU leadership. It was in defence of the "right to work" that the rank-and-file revolted. The tripartite accord included an agreement on lay-offs which brought an end to lifetime employment and dismantled job protection. It was argued that accepting the terms of the existing agreement would destroy workers’ livelihood and lead to a greater decline in workplace conditions. Delegates demanded that the agreement be re-negotiated or a general strike be called. Although the KCTU later quit, then rejoined the accord, the most important lesson was that the trade union leadership is compelled to defend the right to work.

These examples show how workers in Asia have increasingly organised themselves to resist the neo-liberal model of globalisation. Trade unions need to strengthen these struggles so that they will lead to more organising, an increase in collective bargaining power and stronger organisations. Then we will be in a better position not only to oppose the neo-liberal model of globalisation but also to put in place a model of social-democratic globalisation.