MATCHING THE MULTINATIONALS: OBSTACLES TO INTERNATIONAL TRADE UNIONISM

Unions are the potential but secure democratic counterforce to capital. The creation of “objective conditions” for international co‐operation has preceded but must result in “subjective conditions”. This theme survives little challenged as a central tenet of the official labour movement in country after country. The pervasive complacency in other circles concerning the prospects for industrial democracy to be achieved through the internationalisation of the evolutionary, pluralistic collective bargaining model, particularly at a time when that model seems unable to cope with born again free market philosophies even at a national level.