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SOUTH Africa has a long history of militant trade unions and violent clashes between strikers and the police or army.
The famous strike of 1922 even led to the fall of the Jan Smuts government two years later, while the trade union movement played a large role in the downfall of the National Party government in 1990-94.
However, those who believed that the trade unions’ militancy would diminish with the ANC in power were mistaken.
After a relatively short moderate period, the trade unions picked up again, and at present their fierceness is as severe as it ever was.
The Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu) just this week voted for a renewed strike at Impala Platinum [JSE:IMP], although there is still a slender hope that it may be averted.
Also, Irvin Jim, secretary general of the influential National Union of Metalworkers (NUM), this week threatened to renew the strike which paralysed the motor car manufacturing industry earlier this year.
The Wall Street Journal described Jim a few days ago as “a self-described Marxist who displays a photo of the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez behind his desk”.
In an interview with the newspaper, Jim made no secret about the fact that the threatened strike is about more than “double-digit pay increases”: “We cannot have an enclave of white businessmen who own the majority of the economy.
"We need to use the political power acquired in 1994 to address ownership and control of the economy.” One may assume that Amcu’s strike would have similar strategic objectives.
To strike is a normal right in any democracy. Article 23(2)(c) of the South African constitution even entrenches this as a basic human right.
The question is whether it is wise to strike at a time when the world economy, and that of South Africa, is hesitantly lifting its head after the most destructive economic crisis in several decades. Perhaps Amcu and the NUM could do well to study the situation in a country like the Netherlands.
The Netherlands also used to have paralysing strikes. The bravest of these was the strike of February 1941 during the Nazi occupation, against the targeting of Dutch citizens of the Jewish faith.
Of course, the strike was brutally suppressed, but this established strikes for a higher moral principle as something honourable in the Dutch public mind.
However, the economic crisis of the 1970s, brought about mainly by the Arab states’ oil boycott after the Yom Kippur War of 1973, brought the Netherlands to the edge of the economic precipice. The country was rent asunder with polarisation, and even Queen Beatrix’s coronation in 1980 was accompanied by running battles between strikers and squatters on the one hand and the police on the other.
Unemployment skyrocketed, inflation went up and the trade unions demanded high pay rises to compensate.
Government, the organised employers and the trade union looked into the abyss and did not like what they saw. And so, on November 24 1982 their representatives came together in Wassenaar, a suburb of The Hague, and after hard bargaining they signed the Wassenaar Accord.
The accord, less than an A4 sheet, simply came down to this: the trade unions would accept a moderation of pay increases in exchange for a shorter working day. Pay increases of up to 15% during the 1970s - which resulted in a vicious circle of inflation, further pay demands and increasing unemployment - were brought back to less than 5%.
The positive result was almost immediate.
The poisonous atmosphere between especially the employers and unions improved. But perhaps even more importantly, the negative growth of 1.1% of 1981 was improved to a positive growth of 2% in 1982 and 3.6% in 1983.
Unemployment growth was brought to a standstill, and by 1999 employment increased to more than 8% on an annual basis.
After that, the first real reverse was with the economic crisis of 2008 and afterwards.
This year, with the present crisis in full swing, a new accord was signed between government, employers and unions to liberalise the economy. Henceforth, the dole will be limited in time and length, and it will become a little easier for employers to lay off workers in times of crisis.
A point of interest here is that the traditionally left-leaning social democrat Labour Party played a prominent role in both accords.
Of course, this does not mean that economic nirvana has dawned in the Netherlands. Things are still very tough.
But the Dutch national culture is very much marked by what is called the “polder model” – a “polder” being the typical Dutch terrain wrestled from the sea by reclaiming large stretches of land.
It is a consensus model, where there is a will to get out of the problem - whatever it may be - through negotiation and compromise.
South Africa may do well to learn something from this.
- Fin24
*Leopold Scholtz is Media24's correspondent in Europe. Views expressed are his own.
The famous strike of 1922 even led to the fall of the Jan Smuts government two years later, while the trade union movement played a large role in the downfall of the National Party government in 1990-94.
However, those who believed that the trade unions’ militancy would diminish with the ANC in power were mistaken.
After a relatively short moderate period, the trade unions picked up again, and at present their fierceness is as severe as it ever was.
The Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu) just this week voted for a renewed strike at Impala Platinum [JSE:IMP], although there is still a slender hope that it may be averted.
Also, Irvin Jim, secretary general of the influential National Union of Metalworkers (NUM), this week threatened to renew the strike which paralysed the motor car manufacturing industry earlier this year.
The Wall Street Journal described Jim a few days ago as “a self-described Marxist who displays a photo of the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez behind his desk”.
In an interview with the newspaper, Jim made no secret about the fact that the threatened strike is about more than “double-digit pay increases”: “We cannot have an enclave of white businessmen who own the majority of the economy.
"We need to use the political power acquired in 1994 to address ownership and control of the economy.” One may assume that Amcu’s strike would have similar strategic objectives.
To strike is a normal right in any democracy. Article 23(2)(c) of the South African constitution even entrenches this as a basic human right.
The question is whether it is wise to strike at a time when the world economy, and that of South Africa, is hesitantly lifting its head after the most destructive economic crisis in several decades. Perhaps Amcu and the NUM could do well to study the situation in a country like the Netherlands.
The Netherlands also used to have paralysing strikes. The bravest of these was the strike of February 1941 during the Nazi occupation, against the targeting of Dutch citizens of the Jewish faith.
Of course, the strike was brutally suppressed, but this established strikes for a higher moral principle as something honourable in the Dutch public mind.
However, the economic crisis of the 1970s, brought about mainly by the Arab states’ oil boycott after the Yom Kippur War of 1973, brought the Netherlands to the edge of the economic precipice. The country was rent asunder with polarisation, and even Queen Beatrix’s coronation in 1980 was accompanied by running battles between strikers and squatters on the one hand and the police on the other.
Unemployment skyrocketed, inflation went up and the trade unions demanded high pay rises to compensate.
Government, the organised employers and the trade union looked into the abyss and did not like what they saw. And so, on November 24 1982 their representatives came together in Wassenaar, a suburb of The Hague, and after hard bargaining they signed the Wassenaar Accord.
The accord, less than an A4 sheet, simply came down to this: the trade unions would accept a moderation of pay increases in exchange for a shorter working day. Pay increases of up to 15% during the 1970s - which resulted in a vicious circle of inflation, further pay demands and increasing unemployment - were brought back to less than 5%.
The positive result was almost immediate.
The poisonous atmosphere between especially the employers and unions improved. But perhaps even more importantly, the negative growth of 1.1% of 1981 was improved to a positive growth of 2% in 1982 and 3.6% in 1983.
Unemployment growth was brought to a standstill, and by 1999 employment increased to more than 8% on an annual basis.
After that, the first real reverse was with the economic crisis of 2008 and afterwards.
This year, with the present crisis in full swing, a new accord was signed between government, employers and unions to liberalise the economy. Henceforth, the dole will be limited in time and length, and it will become a little easier for employers to lay off workers in times of crisis.
A point of interest here is that the traditionally left-leaning social democrat Labour Party played a prominent role in both accords.
Of course, this does not mean that economic nirvana has dawned in the Netherlands. Things are still very tough.
But the Dutch national culture is very much marked by what is called the “polder model” – a “polder” being the typical Dutch terrain wrestled from the sea by reclaiming large stretches of land.
It is a consensus model, where there is a will to get out of the problem - whatever it may be - through negotiation and compromise.
South Africa may do well to learn something from this.
- Fin24
*Leopold Scholtz is Media24's correspondent in Europe. Views expressed are his own.
