Seeking an Illusion

The New Trade Union Quest for a New Social

Contract after 2011

Labor Protests before the 2011 Uprising:

The acceleration of theNeoliberal economics policiesunder Ahmed Nazif government(2004-2011) has led to the rise ofinequalities.

Thus starting from 2006 to 2010Egypt has experienced thestrongest wave of workersprotests since the end of the 40s.

This wave included blue-collarworkers as well as State’semployees.

Increase of Labor Protests starting from 2005/2006:

2004- 2008, more than1.7 million workersparticipated incollective actions.

Year Workers Protests

2005 202

2006 222

2007 614

2008 609

2009 700

2010 584

State and Labor before 2011: Which Pact?

The Post Colonial State Labourrelations were based on a patron-clientrelationship : the State’s role was toguarantee the workers a certainstandard of living. In return, workersshould provide the State with politicalsupport and production.

For this purpose, a “State-Corporatist”structure was adopted. Nasser foundedETUF to regroup labour and also to co-opt them.

Defective Cooptation...

The disconnection between the cooptedETUF leaders and rank and fileworkers pushed the workers to searchfor alternative channels to address theirgrievances.

Hence, few new trade unions have evenemerged out of the frame of ETUFbefore the 2011 uprising.

The most famous example is thefoundation of the new trade union ofthe State employees of the real estatetax collector in 2009 by the movement’sleader Kamal Abu-Eita.

Labour and 2011 Uprising:

The Egyptian labourmovement has played adecisive role in the 2011Uprising.

When on Feb 7, 2011 theworkers strikes escalatedand spread, the politicalscene has fully changed infavour of the revolution.

After 2011 ? Political Opportunities and Constraints:

The relative opening of the politicalspace that followed the uprising was aPO for the workers. Hundreds of NewTrade Unions emerged quickly.

However, the Egyptian labormovement turned from being animportant driver of change during thedestabilization of authoritarian ruleto a weaker & politically marginalizedactor during the post-revolutionaryperiod after 2011.

• Why was the new tradeunion movement unable,after 2011, to build a newinclusionary social contract(or a new pattern of State-labour relations)?

Methodology:

Around 30 semi-structuredinterviews with labourleaders, labour activists andjournalists (Period: 2011-2015).

Qualitative content analysisof government statements &newspapers’ data.

Framework of Analysis:

The Political Process Model (PPM) which is one ofthe prominent schools of the Social MovementTheory.

This model was built around three concepts:

(1) The Structure of Political Opportunities,

(2) The Mobilization Structures & InternalOrganization.

(3) The Collective Action Framing Process.

Outline:

(1) The Internal Characteristics of the NewTrade Union Movement (Social Resources,Organizational Structures and Leadership).

(2) Its Position in Relation to its “Competitor”ETUF. (Dynamics of Contentious Interactionbetween the Movement & the Political Authoritiesover the New Trade Union Law).

(3) Its Relation to its “Socio-Political Allies”.

(4) Its Collective Action Frame.

(1) The Movement’s Internal Characteristics :

(a) Socio-economic Base.

(b) Internal Organization.

(c) Leadership.

(a) Socio-economic Base:

In fact, the New trade Union Movement has a strongpresence (with a corresponding capacity of collectiveaction) among civil servants and service public sectorworkers. However it remains weak among industrialworkers and in the private sector.

As the figure shows, in 2014, 63% of labor protests wereorganized by Civil Servants while 21,3% of labor protestswere organized by service public sector and 15.4% wereorganized in the private sector.

The strength of the civil servants’ trade unions (such asthe real estate tax collectors) can be explained by the factthat they rely on a previous organizational structurewhich is based on previous collective actions organizedduring the Mubarak era.

The organized civil servants(namely the real estate taxcollectors) succeeded throughorganizing collective protests andlobbying on the parliament topush the later in Jan. 2016 toreject the draft Civil Service LawNo. 18 of 2015 which wasdecreasing their wages.

A Success Story after 2011?

Obstacles in the Public Industrial Sector:

In the Public Industrial Sector, blue collarsremain mostly organized under ETUF umbrella.

Reasons:

ETUF’s Special assets (such as hospitals, clubsand facilitations for beach holidays).

ETUF’s Social funds (provide social securityservices to the affiliated members, andpensions for their retirement).

Obstacles for New Trade Unions in Private Sector:

The Private Sector regroups the majority of Egypt’sworkers (around 73 % of the Egyptian workforce in 2011).New unions have some significant presence in the textileprivate sector & in the petrol industrial private sector.However, the new labor movement faces several challengesin the private sector:

Weakness of the State of Law since workers risk of gettingfired if they engage in any sort of labour activism.

Structure & Wage work since the private sector ispredominated by small firms which are likely to haveirregular and informal employees.

Topography of the New Factories, the fact of being smallerin size and geographically scattered makes it more difficultfor the workers to exert influence in the national level.

Result…?

This lack of social penetrationreduces their capacity to defend theinterests and rights of theirmembers & their ability to push forchange in terms of their relationwith the State.

(b) Internal Organization:

The New Union Federation suffersfrom a structural and democraticdeficit as well as a lack of nationalfunding.

Most important Labour Federations?

(1) The Egyptian Federation forIndependent Trade Unions (EFITU),

(2) The Egyptian Democratic LabourCongress (EDLC).

Constraints and Dilemmas:

(1) Structural Dilemma: Their leader had to decide whether theyshould directly start to organize the newly emerging local unionsinto a nation-wide federation for the sake of being able tonegotiate with the authorities in the name of a certain definedgroup; or whether they should focus first and for a certainperiod of time, on only building powerful local unions?

(2) Democratic Dilemma: Here, the question was whetherfederations should conduct early elections with a view tobuilding a democratic institution or if they should appointexperienced labor leaders and thus temporally sacrifydemocracy for the sake of effectivity?

(3) Financial Dilemma: They quickly had to decide whether toaccept external support at the risk of being discredited by theauthorities or whether to refuse such foreign help and thus loseneeded technical and/or logistical assistance?

Which choices?

(a) Structural Constraint:

EFITU: EFITU’s chose a top-down approach and soughtto incorporate as many as possible of the newly foundedtrade unions. However, this has created a lag between itsinstitutional capacity for coordination and theincreasing number of unions and splits occurred.

By contrast,

EDLC: The NGO Center for Trade Unions and Workers’Services (CTUWS), that would later establish EDLC,pursued the opposite strategy. Yet, this hasn’t protectedthe organization from continuous instability either.

(b) Democracy Constraint:

In EFITU: right after its official foundation, EFITUheld internal elections. This short time frameprivileged those labor leaders that were best knownto the members but who were not necessarily themost efficient. As a result, the federation’slegitimacy was affected and internal powerstruggles emerged.

By contrast,

In EDLC: pursued the opposite approach. This did notprevent power struggles, but it has provided theorganization with better means to deal with internaldifferences.

(c) Foreign Support Dilemma:

Both federations were hardly able to mobilize thefunds needed to cover basic costs.

While Foreign Support was crucial for new tradeunions, it generated problems such as:

Direct financial support from the outside weakened theinternal solidarity among the workers.

It has also increased internal competition for travel andtraining opportunities.

Hence, the mechanism of dependency remainedalthough the mentor has changed.

(c) Leadership:

The dependence of the movement on these two

leaders constrained it because of several reasons:

(1) Lack of Unity: both have refused to unite in one

national Federation.

(2) Lack of Institutional Mechanisms: EFITU was

based on Abu Eita’s Charisma who failed to

establish institutional mechanism for dealing with

conflicts which has especially increased when he

was appointed Minister of Labor in July 2013.

(3) Interference: the interference of CTUWS

headed by Abbas on its internal affairs prevented

the development of internal mechanisms of

democracy, and also hindered the capacity of the

federation to work autonomously.

Result…?

In sum these dilemmas help tounderstand why Egypt’s new tradeunions led - with different degrees-to an organizationally weak & onlypartially representative movementthat lacks the institutional capacityto exert a significant influence onthe authorities.

(2) The New Trade Union Movement Position in Relation to ETUF : its “Competitor”.

(a) Dynamics of ContentiousInteraction under theMorsi’s rule.

(b) Dynamics of ContentiousInteraction under thecurrent Regime.

Although the 2011 uprising createdan opportunity to re-negotiate therules of labor representation andbuild a new Pattern of State- Laborrelation,

the successive governments havefollowed after 2011 the agenda oftheir predecessors: they combined aneoliberal agenda with laborcontainment through Statecorporatism.

State Corporatism & Constraints on New Unionsafter 2011:

MB Strategy for Labor Containment:

The Morsi gov. who adopted a liberaleconomic agenda was in need to takeunpopular economic decisions andthus to constrain the labor’s potentialto resist them.

Hence, the new Minister of Labouradopted a new draft law for tradeunions that strengthened ETUF’sposition vis-à-vis the new unions.

The New Trade Union Movement Counter-Strategy ofResistance :

(1) Organizing Press Conferences and ReleasingStatements where they their rejection of the Morsi’sgovernment new trade union law.

(2) Channelling their demand of an alternative lawthrough Political Channels namely through allying withthe secular opposition (NSF) in order to ensure that thelater will support the trade union law in the nextparliament in March - April 2013. However, theparliamentary elections were postponed.

The Military-led Regime Strategy:

Following President Morsi’s ousterin July 2013, the new military-ledgov. stances’ made the balance ofpower even more unfavorable to thenew trade union movement.

The regime sought to liberalizesome aspects of the economy at theexpense of workers’ interests & re-establishing ETUF’s monopoly onlabor representation.

July 2013: despite the appointment ofAbu Eita as Minister of Labour, he wasnot able to enforce the adoption of anew trade union law.

Since then: the successive ministers oflabour qualified the new unions asillegal entities and proposed severalversions of laws which constrainedtheir right to organize.

The Movement’s Counter Strategy of Resistance:

(1) Channelling its claim through Political Channels:

Under the auspices of The NGO Center for Trade Unionsand Workers’ Services (CTUWS), the “Workers’ Bloc”(membership of 120 unions) was formed July 2014. Itsobjective was to participate the the electoral lists(sahwit masr) and channel through it their demand of anew trade union law in the parliament.

(2) Lobbying and Exerting Pressure:

Lobbying Internally on Executive & LegislativeInstitutions.

Lobbying Externally on Foreign Institution namely theILO.

Result.. ?

All remains pending! Neither the New TradeUnion movement succeed to push the regimeto issue a new trade union law nor theregime (who already faces a difficulteconomic situation) took the decision tosend the trade union draft law restrictingnew trade unions to the Parliament.

Today, the new trade unions remains“constitutional” but “illegal” organizations,while, a State-controlled ETUF re-turned toits pre-2011 dual role as representative toboth the State and the Workers.

(3) Relation with Socio-Political Allies

(a) Relations to PoliticalOrganizations under Morsi’sRule.

(b) Relations to PoliticalOrganizations under Al-SisiRegime.

Relations with Political Organizations:

In post-revolutionary times, the linkage between tradeunions and political parties should be advantageous as itmust provide the parties with political support and offer thelabour a channel to advance its claims and push for theirachievement.

However, in Egypt, labor leaders remain cautious with regardto establishing broader political alliances. In fact, due to theweakness of the political parties, these alliances offer little tothe new trade union federations in terms of channelingworkers’ demands in the political sphere.

Exceptions after 2011? The new trade union movement haschosen to ally with political organizations under specificcircumstances. When? (1) Communication and negotiationwith the state broke down and/or, (2) When such an alliancewas seen even temporarily as mutually beneficial.

Ephemeral change under Morsi? The break of all ways of negotiations

between the Minister of Labour and the newtrade unions with regards to new unions’freedoms,

Alliance with NSF: pushed the new unionmovement to ally in early 2012 with thesecular opposition in order to ensure thatthe later will support the trade union law inthe next parliament.

30th of June Uprising: as a consequence of thenegotiations' blockage and the change of costbenefit analysis regarding the participationin street politics, the new trade unionsfederations responded, positively to the calllaunched by the (Tamarod) movement.

Relative Change under Al-Sisi?

Again with the deadlock of the negotiationswith regard to the trade union law, severalinitiatives were launched by either themovement or by its political allies :

Workers’ Bloc: the “Workers’ Bloc” (with amembership of 120 unions) in July 2014.

The Campaign “Together for Unions’Freedoms (maa’n lel-huriat al-nikabyia)which was initially launched by (al-eish walhoria) leftist party. Actually, the campaignand the solidarity of the political forces wasgreeted by a new trade union movement thatfeels an existential threat.

Result?

In sum, the new union movement’scontentious interaction with the State after2011 has led to a pragmatic, yet verygradual change in its relationship withpolitical organizations.

However, the fact that these alliance offerlittle to the new trade union federations interms of a possibility to channel theworkers’ demands in the political sphere, isweakening the movement even more.

(4) Collective Action Frames:

While the emergence of the new tradeunion movement was based in pre-2011on a narrow agenda of specificsocioeconomic demands, after 2011, theindependent trade unions broadenedtheir agenda to include politico-institutional demands and broader socio-economic claims such as the demand for anew trade union law & the claim for ageneral minimum wage.

These demands related to freedom ofassociation and social justice enabled thebridging of claims with otheroppositional organizations as previouslymentioned.

No Challenge to the State though?Nevertheless the local new tradeunions refrained from openlybreaking with the State (especiallyafter July 2013). They have continuedto frame their demands in strictlyeconomic terms that would notchallenge the authorities.

For instance, in 2014, from the 1655labor protests: 49% of them claimedwage claims whereas 1.5%, claimedright to freely organize and asked forthe freedom of trade unionism(ECESR, 2015).

Analyzing this Narrow Collective Action Frame.. :

(1) The relation to politics of Local Labor leaders : while thetop level of the New Unions’ Federations includes politicizedleaders, most local trade union leaders mainly focus onserving the short-term economic demands of the rank andfile workers. Contrary to the 70s and 80s, during whichleftist or Nasserite leaders led the labor movement, one canfind that the new generation of leaders, at the level of thelocal federations, is largely depoliticized.

(2) The internal disconnection among the Labor’sFederations different levels: while local labor leaders rarelysupported the national federations’ push for a substantialchange in State-labor relations, the weakness of thecoordination’s mechanisms between local & top levelswithin these federations, made it impossible to generateconsensus around a broader collective action frame.

Result?

The rather narrow nature of the demandsraised by the new trade union movementreflects not only:

(1) the difficult political context in whichit operates but also,

(2) the failure of the movement itself toestablish reliable internal structures ofcoordination & representation.

This situation both reflects and reinforcethe relative political isolation of the newtrade union movement.

Conclusive Remarks:

(1) Although the 2011 uprising offered a P.O for new unions, it hasposed to the later huge organizational challenges which they werehardly able to confront as they lacked previous organizationalstructures.

(2) Moreover, the New Unionist Movement emerged in a difficultconjuncture which obliged it not only to interact with rapid politicalchanges but also & simultaneously stage resistance to austeritymeasures.

(3) These two factors combined to produce a fragmented,organizationally weak and only partially representative movement thatremain - until today - unable to resist the repressive State-corporatistState-labor relations.

(4) Egypt’s independent labor movement was not only intrinsicallyweak but also suffered from a lack of reliable alliances. The support itsreceived from political organizations remained sporadic and issue-specific. Here, the movement’s narrow collective action frame bothreflected and reinforced its relative political isolation.

Future Scenarios:

(1) Statu quo scenario: weakly organized labourmovement versus a repressive regime.

(2) Pessimistic scenario: social explosion because oflack of tools of channelling grievances while economicpressures on labour increases.

(3) Optimistic scenario: a new generation of labourleaders succeed to organize the movement and changethe balance of power.

“Gramsci said: “The old remains alive and the new isnot born yet” !

for your attention !!