Whatever power the unions have lost on the ground, they are greatly making up for on the World Wide Web. 'Internet stewards' and 'cyber pickets', reports Steve Davies, are mobilising fellow trade unionists on an international scale
People Management, 17 Sep 1998
From Seoul to Sao Paulo, Manchester to Manila and Cape Town to Quebec, trade unions are using the World Wide Web in imaginative and innovative ways.
There are more than 1,700 union web sites worldwide, with more coming online daily. Development began slowly. At first many unions set up "vanity sites", with virtually no information and little, if any, interactivity.
Today, the best union web sites offer to large numbers of their members policy and strategy direct from head office. They often also feature a discussion forum. But it is in the pursuit of industrial disputes that trade unions have made the greatest impact on the Internet.
Last year, US lawyer Paul Heylman told delegates at an international shipping employers' conference that they should regularly check union web sites for news on strike targets, as "it seems highly likely that labour's battles with management will become increasingly transnational". Three recent examples stand out.
The Liverpool dockers' dispute was one of the defining moments in awakening union activists to the possibilities of the Internet. An international campaign was constructed on a shoestring, supported by unpaid Internet enthusiasts. (see case study "Dockers define union activism on the Internet")
Chris Bailey, the co-ordinator of LabourNet, which began as a site supporting the Liverpool dockers and has developed into an international news and discussion site, argues that developments such as global campaigning and almost instant co-ordination of action cannot come as a surprise.
Bailey believes that, like the union reaction to 19th-century free trade, the response of the movement to today's globalisation "must be international solidarity. But it too must be with computer communication."
The International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mining and General Workers' Unions (Icem) is also a trailblazer. With around 20 million members, it was the first to launch a "cyber picket" of a multinational company: tyre giant Bridgestone/Firestone (BFS). The campaign's symbol was a black flag, which in motor racing signifies immediate disqualification for a serious rule violation.
Icem identified the e-mail addresses of top company executives worldwide and published links to them on its web site, urging affiliates and sympathisers to send e-mail messages supporting the workers with a copy of the black flag computer graphic downloaded from the Icem site. (see case study "Net helps unions get to grips with tyre company")
The unions believe that the cyber campaign played an important part in their success in this dispute. According to Jim Catterson, Icem's chemical and process industries officer: "The Bridgestone/Firestone campaign was the first time that unions used a company's own web presence against them."
Catterson emphasises that "virtually all of this information came from the company's own web site. Often all we did was publish a link to their own online contact lists." He denies that this constitutes "cyber terrorism". "I see its real benefit as raising awareness about a dispute and spreading information, as well as allowing an individual to actually do something in support easily and cheaply," he says.
Possibly the first national industrial dispute in which a union used the Internet as a matter of course was last year's dispute between the Teamsters and United Parcel Services.
The Teamsters used a combination of traditional and high-tech methods to communicate with members and to pursue the dispute, including daily printable updates and a global conference call. (see case study "Virtual press releases deliver triumph over UPS")
Icem's Jim Catterson believes that use of the net will have far-reaching implications for unions. He expects union demands for access to employers' Internet communications systems to become a normal part of the bargaining process, especially at companies covered by European works councils. "I seriously think that it's going to change how organisations are structured," he says.
Donald MacDonald, vice-president at the UK's Communications Workers Union, views union Internet activity as essential rather than optional. He warns that "the Internet has the power to switch transmission facilities, control production lines, determine new products and even further distort the imbalances in the world economy. It is a very political tool and we need to keep up to speed in order to understand and, where possible, correct the negative features through mass electronic activism."
Flying pickets may have disappeared but it looks as though cyber pickets are here to stay.
Steve Davies is a former full-time trade union officer
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