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| Emilio Gabaglio as ETUC Secretary General signing the European Framework Agreement on Teleworking, Brussels 16/O7/2002. (Foto: ETUC) |
While
the two International Wood and Construction federations were looking
for some kind of merger or cooperation between the WCL and the ICFTU
debates had started about some kind of a merger or institutionalized
cooperation or the creation of a new World Organisation. It happened
that Emilio Gablagio had elaborated a note that served as a kind of
discussion paper for the two informal meetings the WCL and the ICFTU
Executive Committees have held at the beginning of 2004.
The
note was used also as an introduction to the internal WCL debates at
the European section held on the 18th of March 2004 about the future
cooperation between WCL and ICFTU. However, to status of the Gabaglio
note was not clear to the participants. Therefore WCL Deputy
Secretary general Jaap Wienen explained the role of the note:
“Because
there seems to be some confusion on the status of the note Gabaglio
note, Jaap Wienen (Deputy Secr. General of WCL) gives some further
explanation on the chronological events. Two meetings with the ICFTU
took place. During the first meeting, Gabaglio presented his point of
view. The political secretariat reflected on these statements, but
did not have the mandate to discuss changes. These reflections had
some effect on the second note, but it was not possible for the (WCL)
secretariat to discuss all possible alternatives. The note is
therefore not a reflection of the two political secretariats, and
will not be the final document.”
What
was not explained, is why Gabaglio was invited at both meetings nor
why he prepared the note. Gabaglio had been ETUC
Secretary General from 1991 until 2003. Before 1991 he had worked for
17 years at the ICFTU on various positions. Before, in 1969 he was
elected National President of ACLI (Italian Workers' Christian
Associations). During his presidency of ACLI a conflict raised with the
Italian Catholic Hierarchy. Gabaglio organised at the end of August
1970 in Vallombrosa, Italy an ACLI Congress titled “Workers
movement, Capitalism and Democracy” during which was
introduced the hypothesis of the 'Socialist ACLI'.
Only
a year later
ACLI was publicly disowned by the Italian Episcopal Conference and
the repudiation was later confirmed June 19, 1971 by Pope Paul VI in
person. In spite of the almost immediate reverse of Gabaglio and his
subsequent self-criticism, ACLI split in two factions.
 |
"Philip
Jennings is the General Secretary of UNI Global Union, an
organisation with over 20 million members, representing 900 unions in
over 150 countries and with its head office in Nyon. In May 2013 UNI
Global Union was at the centre of worldwide press coverage, as the
“Bangladesh Safety Accord ”, a legally binding agreement by major
US and European clothes manufacturers to raise safety standards in
Bangladesh factories, was negotiated in Nyon by both UNI Global union
and Industriall." See interview 'Living in Nyon', September 18, 2013. (Foto: Living in Nyon)
|
As
already explained before, ETUC Secretary General Gabaglio was not
capable to convince EUROFIET to respect the statutes of the ETUC.
According to the ETUC statutes each European member of the WFCW had
the right to be a member of EUROFIET but EUROFIET refused and had its
own conditions. This arrogant power policy of EUROFIET against the
ETUC rules led to the departure of two important WFCW members what of
course meant a weakening of the WFCW. Was this what the EUROFIET
wanted? May be yes, may be not, but what is sure that for the
EUROFIET pluralism was not important, and deliberately wanted to
maintain its monopoly in the European social dialogue. This is not
only a shame for a democratic organization like EUROFIET (now UNI)
but also for its Secretary General Philip Jennings as a citizen
from Great Britain, one of the oldest democracies in the world. (See
also: The Downfall of the WCL 12 and 13)
Back
to the note of Emilio Gabalglio because in the note are made some
interesting statements about the history of WCL and ICFTU.
“1.2.
During the Cold War and after the creation of the ICFTU in 1949 (the
split within the WFTU), the three main international organisations
had each a specific role, according to its nature:
-
The ICFTU was dominated by the leading organisations of
industrialized countries. Most of them had links with
social-democratic parties in Europe, with an AFL-CIO working in the
wake of the foreign policy of the United States.
-
The IFCTU (which became the WCL in 1968), a Christian organisation
whose proposals also took into account spiritual aspects.
-
The WFTU, which comprised organisations having links with communist
parties.”
In
other words: the ICFTU was social democratic and socialist and
therefore class struggle oriented. The WCL was social-christian
oriented and because of its spiritual values against class-struggle
and for social dialogue. The WFTU was part of the communist party
strategy and on international level controlled by the Soviet Union as
the main communist world power.
Why
the AFL-CIO was a member of the ICFTU? The AFL-CIO had its leftist
oriented groups but its majority never questioned the free market
capitalism, like European ICFTU and also WCL members did. On the
contrary, the AFL-CIO was a loyal promotor of the free-market
capitalism in the Third World like for example in Latin America where
the AFL-CIO dominated ORIT, the regional partner of ICFTU, at a
certain moment supported dictatorships and US interventions against
leftist political leaders (Dominican republic and Guatemala). Without
doubt the AFL-CIO functioned during the Cold War as as the promotor
of US interests and its free-market capitalist model.
In
the Gabaglio note we read the following about the ETUC:
“1.3
During the 1960's, the European trade unions of the WCL and the ICFTU
strengthened their cooperation links. Some debates were then opened
in Europe, leading to the creation of the ETUC in 1973. Before
reaching a compromise (the idea met with some hesitation and
resistance by some WCL organisations, the ECFTU (ICFTU's European
regional organisation) became the ETUC, which meant that any WCL
organisation could become an affiliate to this new confederation
created to act as a counterbalance to the development of the EEC
(that later on became the EU). That
is why it was impossible to negotiate the creation of a WCL- specific
space.”
Gabaglio
explains here not only why the ETUC always had been dominated by the
ICFTU members but also why trade union pluralism was never on the
agenda of the ICFTU. Everybody with some feeling for international
policy and strategy could understand that in the long run this
anti-pluralism attitude will end in the destruction of the WCL as a
minority. Why the WCL did not make this analysis is a mystery. Was it
because of lack of leadership, confusion about the road to follow or
because European WCL members were losing their spiritual values? May
be a
little bit of
each?
1.3.
Weakened during World War II (after breaking off relations with
Central and Eastern European organisations and as a consequence of
the creation of single confederations in Germany and Austria, under
the Anglo-American pressure), the WCL gained ground worldwide ,
thanks to the creation of regional organisations or coordination
offices: CLAT in 1954 in Latin America, BATU in 1963 in Asia, UPTC in
1959, FOPADESC in 1973 and finally the DOAWTU in 1993 in Africa.”
1.4
The “industrialized countries” base decreased after the
disaffiliation of:
-
The CFDT in 1973 (replaced by the CFTC France)
-
The NKV in 1978 (which merged with NVV to create FNV Netherlands)
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Quebec's CSN in 1986.”
The
ideological seduction of socialism was not the only factor that
played a role but sure it was one of the factors why these 3 trade
union federations did leave WCL. Of course it is very ironic that
this happened within more or less two decades before the communist
model based on socialist values in the Soviet Union, center and
Eastern Europe collapsed completely. Also ironic was that the
Christian oriented Solidarnosc trade union in Poland together with
the Polish Pope John Paul II played a decisive role in the fall of
communism. It was the victory of social christian and democratic
values on communist values.
Gabaglio
shows us in the next paragraph that for the ICFTU trade union
pluralism was never important:
“1.6
After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the ICFTU exerted some
pressure on the WCL for both organisations to merge, arguing that from
that moment on, trade union pluralism at the international level was
no longer justified.
I
have never had an inside view in the policy kitchen of the ICFTU so I
can only guess what kind of ideas existed within the ICFTU. So let me
guess. Apparently, the Cold War justified international trade union
pluralism (however, for ICFTU trade union pluralism in the Western
world was never important, it was tolerated mainly because it
existed) but now the communist model had collapsed and free-market
capitalism had definitely won, seemingly trade union pluralism had
definitively also come to an end.
What
happened with this intent of merger? Gabaglio tells us the following:
1.7
After many debates, a proposal was made: the WCL could then become an
organisation (foundation...) aimed at fostering the development of
trade unionism in developing countries (training, debates, financial
aid, and so forth).
1.8
Beyond the fact that the debate was obviously far from being closed
(given the wounds opened by ORIT in Latin America during the military
dictatorships), the ICFTU's arrogance also played an essential role
in the failure of the dialogue process. The proposal on the creation
of an organisation focused on the Third World was not accepted.
Neither was the idea of an outright merger.”
I
had learned to know the arrogance of the ICFTU during my work in
Central and Eastern Europe after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Every
ICFTU representative on every occasion, was it a national trade union
congress, a seminar or a meeting, started with the observation that
the ICFTU with its millions of members is the greatest and the most
important trade union organisation in the world. It never occurred to
these spokesmen that next to the quantity component there is a
quality component, that of vision, values and ideas. It was precisely
the Polish trade union Solidarnosc that showed to Central and Eastern
Europe how important ideas were in the struggle against communism.
