Social movement unionism
As reported last year, Jane Parker has been undertaking a study examining why and how the
TUC engages in alliance building with civil movements and groups. Drawing on interviews with
senior TUC officials and documentation, the study has investigated the rationale for such
activity; the nature of the alliances; and the extent to which they inform TUC efforts towards
union revival. Parker presented a paper based on the findings at the IIRA’s 8th European
Congress in September, and a further version will be presented at the 22nd AIRAANZ conference
in Melbourne in February 2008. Main conclusions included:
•
most of the TUC’s recent, and indeed earlier, civil alliances have been interpreted as a
‘tool’ for other union revival strategies, notably recruiting, organising and political
engagement. Some have also shown elements of the labour movement’s capacity to act as
a ‘sword of justice’.
•
little is known about the relative significance of particular revival strategies or their
interactive effects. It is thus difficult to calculate the utility of civil alliances involving the
TUC for other revival strategies or their relative contribution to union revival;
•
notwithstanding this, and though not its main focus or activity, TUC interest in civil
alliance-building is gathering momentum due to an array of internal and external factors
(detailed in the research outputs). The TUC’s role as an alliance partner continues to
unfurl, particularly in respect of ‘big issues’ such as international development and
environmentalism, and lower profile but essential matters such as the availability of
learning services to all. The varied ways in which the TUC reaches out to external civil
groups reflects its multiple roles as well as the diversity of its alliance partners;
•
a number of possible ‘ideal’ conditions for developing high calibre civil alliances emerge,
including: a general need to develop long-term strategy, commitment and resources; the
existence of mutually beneficial aims for the alliance partners; balanced, consensus-based
policy which can be flexibly applied; the means to manage tensions over often complex
alliance interests and how they are to be pursued in practice; and partner organisations’
capacity to coordinate their departments and sections’ alliance activities.
•
while certain features of alliances (e.g. loci of control and activities) will always test the
TUC’s authority, it is thus currently well-placed to offer a coordinating and advisory role,
and potentially, more.
•
while much of the TUC’s involvement in civil alliances has been emphasised in terms of
labour movement revitalisation, some of the evidence gathered suggests that recent and
potential activity has greater potential to broaden the purpose of the labour movement
than might have been initially thought. The diversity of many TUC and labour movement
activists and officials, identity-based groups, constituents and their links to other social
movements and organisations suggest that the nature and scope of overall alliance
activity has been underreported. Conceptualisations of the primary purpose of British
unions may thus need to emphasise more that broader purpose unionism can help unions
to respond to work-based issues in a more informed manner.