NAFTA's Labor Side Agreement and International Labor Solidarity

Abstract

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and its supplemental labor pact, the North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation (NAALC) reflect the uneven advances of labor rights advocacy in connection with international trade. NAFTA provides extensive rights and protections for multinational firms and investors in such areas as intellectual property rights and investment guarantees. The NAALC only partially addresses labor rights and labor conditions, but within its limits it has shown itself to be a viable tool for cross‐border solidarity among key actors in the trade union, human rights, and allied movements. The NAALC's principles and complaint mechanisms create new space for advocates to build coalitions and take concrete action to articulate challenges to the status quo and advance workers' interests. Cooperation, consultation, and collaboration among social actors have brought a qualitative change to transnational labor rights networks in North America.

International Institutions and Transnational Advocacy: The Case of the North American Agreement on Labour Cooperation

“…One well-documented consequence of the NAALC almost from its inception has been the facilitating role it has played in fostering transnational networking among unions and labour rights activists in the three countries (Compa;2001. This is in sharp contrast to the situation prior to the NAALC, where there was distance and even distrust between unions in the U.S. and in Mexico.…”

“…7 Articles and reports that document the earlier cases include Human Rights Watch, 2001, Compa, 2001, Schurtman, 2005, Graubart, 2005. Questions concerning the efficacy are raised by Delp et.…”

“…Other illustrative cases include MEX submission 2003-01 (North Carolina or H-2A Visa Program) seeking protection of collective rights, health and safety, minimal labor standards, discrimination and protection of migrant workers; US 2005-01 (Labor Law Reform) which sought to stop the approval of a Labor Law Reform in Mexico under the argument that the government bill was intended to codify systemic violation of collective rights including freedom of association, collective bargaining and strike and also social and political rights; US 2005-02 (Mexican Pilots-ASPA) which sought protection of collective rights of pilots by arguing that the 40 The Apple Growers case has been usefully discussed in Compa, 2001. Mexican government failed to enforce its own laws in accordance with international labor conventions, the national constitution, and the principles of the NAALC; US 2005-03 (Hidalgo), which alleged violations of collective and individual rights of workers of the textile industry by the Mexican government, alleging that the government failed to enforce its law with respect to equitable and transparent labor tribunal proceedings; MEX 2005-01 (H-2B Visa Workers) related to the precarious situation of migrant workers in Idaho, and the MEX 2006-01 (State of North Carolina) which sought protection for the collective bargaining rights of government employees in the state of North Carolina under the argument that the state failed to follow International Conventions, the NAALC, and principles of international law.…”

Global unions: Chasing the dream or building the reality?

“…Trade unions are either excluded from these, or included with severely prescribed powers, and engaged in decision-making where they are not disposed to support the initial premise of the argument. Characteristic examples might be a comparison of the in fluence and power of an institution such as the International Labour Organization with that of the World Trade Organization; or the limited impact of trade union voice in the North American Free Trade Agreement (but see Compa, 2001, for some examples of solidarity action). A concomitant development has been the emergence of civil society organizations that replicate or replace trade union activity, and assume a representational function that has greater influence within global governmental organizations (see Eade and Leather, 2005, for a collection that discusses this relationship).…”

Charles Tilly, globalization, and labor’s citizen rights

“…Although much was made of the "race to the bottom" in the late 1990s, Latin Americanists have shown that institutional channels exist to protect labor's rights (Compa 2001;Kay 2005;Murillo and Schrank 2005).…”