Aaron Santos/ILO/Flickr. CC (by-nc-nd)
It has always surprised me how rarely trade unions are raised in the conversation on forced labour. Their fundamental purpose is to secure better conditions for workers, in part by using collective action to identify and rectify the structural and systemic problems occurring within their sectors. As such, they should be central and essential actors within any serious effort to root out forced labour in the global economy today.
Yet trade union voices have been almost entirely shut out of the conversation. Governments, business and many NGOs have instead chosen to rely upon voluntary corporate disclosure, supplier auditing, and awareness raising campaigns to catch ‘bad apples’ and alter corporate and supplier behaviour for the better. At the same time, business and government have markedly curtailed unions’ ability to operate effectively through an array of measures, including subcontracting, hostile laws and regulations, and new forms of insecure employment. This has left trade unions with severely limited options as they have sought to retain or regain their relevance, especially in the face of what has perhaps been business’ most effective tool for capturing the fight against forced labour for themselves: corporate social responsibility initiatives, or CSR.
