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  Issue No 82 Official Organ of LaborNet 20 December 2000  

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International

Eric Lee's Year in Review


The editor of Labourstart looks back on the global issues that mobilized labour in the past 12 months.

 
 

Labourstart's Eric Lee

Some say it was the first year of the new millennium, but scholars will point out that it really was only the last year of the last one. The third millennium doesn't actually start for another couple of weeks. Regardless, it was an incredibly exciting year for the labour movement worldwide. As I look over LabourStart for the last year, I see at least four major recurring news stories.

Violence against Workers and their Unions:

The first major news story we reported on LabourStart this year was a tragic one -- the first death of a striker on a picket line in New Zealand since 1912. January also saw coverage of the International Federation of Journalists' annual report on the killing of members of their profession (87 in 1999). In Ecuador that month, police attacked strikers and protesting students with tear gas. Two months later, the International Confederation of Trade Union's reported that neighboring country Colombia holds the world record for killing trade unionists, with 3,000 dead in the last decade. In El Salvador riot police broke a medical workers strike by occupying clinics in February. In Indonesia in March, unions demanded a probe into the killing of a union activist; five days later, police in Turkey attacked and beat workers attending a memorial meeting. In April the Bolivian government used the army to crack down on union protests; meanwhile in South Korea riot police were used for the same purpose. In late June, the South Korean riot police made headlines around the globe as they stormed a luxury hotel where the workers had been engaged in peaceful strike action. Violence continued in Korea throughout the summer. In September the ICFTU reported that 140 trade unionists were killed in 1999.

Unions and the Struggle for Democracy

The year begin with two labour movements fighting it out against anti-democratic forces -- one in Zimbabwe, where the leader of the country's unions challenged Mugabe, and the other in Austria, where unions were active in the protests against the "Blue-Black" national government set up with the participation of the fascist Haider. At year's end we reported on the struggle by American trade unions to get every vote counted in the disputed Florida presidential contest. Unions also took a leading role in the struggle for democracy in two of Europe's last dictatorships -- in Serbia and Belarus. Coal miners were in the forefront of the successful movement to topple the Milosevic regime. But at year's end Mugabe was still in power in Zimbabwe, Haider's party sat comfortably in the Austrian coalition, the Belarussian dictator Lukashenko was still in power, and George W. Bush was declared president-elect. At least Milosevic was gone.

General strikes:

This old tactic, largely forgotten in the industrialized West, was used again and again by embattled unions around the globe -- sometimes with successful results. Millions took to the streets in a general strike organized by the Congress of South African Trade Unions in May -- their first such action since the end of Apartheid and one which revealed new tensions between unions and the government. The South Korean unions held a general strike of their own in early June, but it appears to have petered out. The Israeli unions called off their general strike at the very last moment as the Labour government of Ehud Barak caved in to many of their demands. The Nigerian general strike in June also ended in success, as the government lowered petrol prices. The same happened to the general strike in Mozambique in July -- called off when the government backed down.

Unions and the New Technology:

There were some extraordinary developments this year, beginning with the announcement by Ford and the United Auto Workers early in February that the company would be giving away computers and Internet access to 350,000 of its employees world-wide. Several other companies followed up with similar announcements. But there was bad news as well: a week after Ford's announcement, a US court authorized Northwest Airlines to seize personal computers from the homes of employees who had been involved in organizing an "illegal" sick-out using email. In late February, union organizers at Los Angeles International Airport placed ads on the Yahoo! website that would appear every time someone looked up the name of the company which had been targeted for unionization -- ads which pointed to the union's website and which made clear that the company was violating labour laws left and right; Yahoo! pulled the ads under pressure, but this was met by a union demonstration at their headquarters. In March, Workers Online reported on a mysterious blocking of access to the website of the New South Wales Teachers Federation. In July the international labour movement proposed a new '.union' top level domain on the Internet -- and the proposal was promptly shot down in November by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). ICANN held its first world-wide online elections to its board -- and independent labour candidate Eric Lee placed 4th out of 54 candidates running in the North American region. The year ended with the dramatic announcement -- nearly simultaneously in four countries -- of a global drive to unionize the flagship of the "new economy" -- Amazon.com.

Much more happened than this in 2000, but as I scanned the headlines, it struck how many news stories dealt with violence against workers, the struggle for democracy, general strikes and the new technology


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In this issue
Features
*  Interview: Being Michael Costa
Labor Council�s secretary on the 2KY sell-off, the Olympics and his plans for the future.
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*  Unions: Millennial Milestones
In a year of highs, some trade union stories stuck in the collective consciousness. Here's ten of the best.
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*  International: Eric Lee's Year in Review
The editor of Labourstart looks back on the global issues that mobilized labour in the past 12 months.
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*  Organising: Dispatches from the Field
Despite the 'Botsmanesque' critiques which have been levelled at Organising, it would be hard to deny that the year 2000 has seen more and more unions in NSW latch onto the approach - at least in principle anyway.
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*  Economics: Who Gets Gold??
At the end of this Olympic year, Sydney Uni's Frank Stilwell charts the winners and losers in the new sport of redistribution of income.
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*  Politics: Election 2000: The Winner is Gridlock
In the last in his series on the US Federal Election Campaign, Michael Gadiel, our roving reporter, gladly signs off.
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*  Satire: Chaser Launches Book
In the great tradition of repackaging old material to cash in on Christmas, the team from The Chaser & Silly 2000 has produced its first book.
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*  Review: Cultural Wasteland
The spotlight was on Australian culture in 2000. But was it a missed opportunity, asks Peter Zangari.
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News
»  Mad Monk's Secret Union Past
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»  New Life for Trades Hall
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»  Top Cop is Our Organiser of the Year
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»  All We Want for Christmas
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»  Summer for Social Justice
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»  Unions Return to Mosh Pit
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»  Unions Head West
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»  Big Bastard Censors Dissidents
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»  South Coast Labor President Steps Down
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»  As a Died in the Wool Westie Steps Up
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»  Dying Workers' Asbestos Plea
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»  Workers at Centre of Turn Of the Century
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»  Truth about S11 Starting to Come Out
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Columns
»  The Soapbox
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»  The Locker Room
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»  Trades Hall
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»  Tool Shed
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Letters to the editor
»  The Greatest Team Ever?
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»  ABC Online Did Strike
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»  Why Nader Vote was not Wasted
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»  John Scrooge's Christmas Gift
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