TRADE UNIONS IN THE INDEPENDENT STATES OF CENTRAL ASIA AND THE CAUCASUS: PRESENT STATE, PROBLEMS, AND PROSPECTS
Abstract
The trade unions that operate in the independent states of Central Asia and the Caucasus have had to adjust to the world financial and economic crisis and its repercussions, rising unemployment, increasing informal employment, illegal trade migration, etc. They must show more efficiency when dealing with social and labor conflicts, find new and more efficient forms of cooperation between employers and employees, and learn to coordinate their efforts.
The events which shook the world trade union movement in 2008-2011 (trade unions were actively involved in the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt; mass riots; the nationwide strike and protest movements in Greece; demonstrations in Australia caused by the financial crisis; and strikes in Russia) show that trade unions must readjust their goals, formulate new tasks, and create new technologies.
The events of 2007-2010 in Central Asia and the Caucasus, caused, in particular, by the financial crisis in Kazakhstan (large-scale strikes of workers who demanded that some enterprises should be nationalized, which forced the authorities to retaliate), showed that changes were long overdue.
Today, the trade union movement in both regions is a conglomerate of monopolist trade unions which actively cooperate with the authorities, on the one hand, and small alternative and independent structures, on the other.
The monopolists1 inherited their well-known faults from the Soviet trade unions; they are never invited to discuss draft laws and state budgets or to attend the hearings of the executive structures, etc. Alternative and independent trade unions are much less developed in Kazakhstan, Georgia, and Kyrgyzstan than, for example, in Belarus. There is any number of scholarly publications dealing with the trade union movement in the post-Soviet expanse in 2008-2011.2 The Central Asia and the Caucasus journal publishes articles dealing with the roles of independent trade unions, the forms and methods of their activities, and their possible prospects.3
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The Confederation of Trade Unions of Azerbaijan; the Confederation of Trade Unions of Armenia; the United Trade Unions of Georgia; the Federation of Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan; the Federation of Trade Union of Kyrgyzstan; the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Tajikistan; the National Trade Union Center of Turkmenistan; and the Federation of Trade Unions of Uzbekistan.
See: S. Clarke, T. Pringle, “Can Party-led Trade Unions Represent Their Members?” Post-Communist Economies, Vol. 21, No. 1, 2009, pp. 85-101; V.E. Mozhaev, Mirovoy finansovo-ekonomicheskiy krizis i mezhdunarodnoe profdvizhenie,” Trud i sotsialnye otnoshenia, No. 1, 2009, pp. 63-70; K.S. Ramankulov, “Kontseptualnye osnovy novogo Zakona Kyrgyzskoy Respubliki ‘O profsoiuzakh’,” Vestnik Kyrgyzsko-Rossiyskogo slavianskogo universiteta, Vol. 10, No. 4, 2010, pp. 79-83; N.R. Zhotabaev, Trudovaia migratsia i zashchita prav trudiashchikhsia migrantov,” Trud i sotsialnye otnoshenia, No. 5, 2009, pp. 27-31; S. Mukashev, “Profsoiuzny aktiv—bazovaia nadstroyka,” in: Obshchestvo i my, Almaty, 2010, pp. 346-349; L. Martynov, “Profsoiuzy Kazakhstana i tripartizm: realnost i perspektivy,” in: Trekhstoronnee soglashenie po sotsialnomu partnerstvu, Almaty, 2010, pp. 23-26.
See, for example: G. Lortkipanidze, “Politicheskie pristrastiia elity na fone demokratii perekhodnogo perioda (na primere Gruzii,” Tsentral’naia Azia i Kavkaz, No. 6, 1999; L. Smirnov, “The Marginalization of the Population as a Factor of Sociopolitical Instability in Kazakhstan,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 4, 2000; H. Amrekulov, K kontseptsii ustoychivogo razvitia grazhdanskogo sektora Kazakhstana,” Tsentral’naia Azia, No. 2, 1997; E. Kisriev, Daghestan Factors of Conflicts and Stability,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 4, 2000; I. Karsakov, “Osobennost.
See: The Law of the Republic of Armenia on Trade Unions, available at [www.parliament.am].
See: The Law of the Azerbaijan Republic on Trade Unions, website of the Hot Line Service of the International Workgroup for approving international human rights in Azerbaijan [www.dem.az].
The Law of the Republic of Kazakhstan on Trade Unions, website of the Federation of Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan [www.fprk.kz].
See: Strategiia deiatelnosty profsoiuzov RK na 2010-1015 gg., adopted 3 June, 2010, available at [www.fprk.kz].
Labor Law of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, 7 February, 2007, website of the International Labor Organization (ILO) [www.ilo.org].
Today, it has become obvious that trade union organizations should be set up in private small and medium enterprises, 12 November, 2010, website of the Azeri State Telegraph Agency [www.azertag.com].
See: “V Armenii zakliucheno pervoe regionalnoe kollectivnoe soglashenie,” 24 September, 2010, available at [www.vkp.ru].
See: I.A. Karimov, Kontseptsia dalneyshego uglublenia demokraticheskikh reform i formirovaniia grazhdansko-go obshchestva v strane, Report at a joint sitting of the Legislative Chamber and the Senate of Oliy Mazhlis of the Repub-lic of Uzbekistan, 12 November, 2010, available at [www.press-service.uz].
See: “Afghanistan Adopts First Ever Decent Work Country Program,” 17 July, 2010, available at [www.ilo.org].
See: “V Astane Genprokuratura i Federatsia profsoiuzov podpisali memorandum o sotrudnichestve,” 10 June, 2011,available at [www.fprk.kz].
See: “Khamkorlik Bitimi imzolandi,” 6 May, 2011, available at [www.sfp.uz].
See: “Proftsentry Kazakhstana, Kyrgyzstana i Tadzhikistana budut vmeste zashchishchat prava trudiashchikhsia-migrantov,” 6 April, 2011, available at [www.vkp.ru].
See: N.A. Nazarbaev, Vystuplenie na respublikanskom Forume po voprosam sotsialnoy otvetstvennosti biznessa,24 January, 2008, available at [www.akorda.kz].
See: D.V. Lobok, “Rol profsoiuznoy nauki v sozdanii novoy modeli razvitia obshchestva,” Trud i sotsialnye ot-noshenia, No. 4, 2009, p. 86.
See: “O sostoianii zaniatosti i migratsii naselenia v stranakh SNG,” Vestnik profsoiuzov, No. 5, 2011, p. 43.
See: E. Tumasian, “Prioritet—zaniatosti, okharane truda i dostoynoy zarabotnoy plate,” Vestnik profsoiuzov, No. 4,2011, p. 50.
See: “Georgia: Labor Code Tears Fundamental Rights to Shreds, web-site of International Trade Union Confed-eration [www.ituc-csi.org].
See: “Problemy regulirovania regionalnoy trudovoy migratsii obsuzhdeny v Astane,” 4 April, 2011, available at [www.fprk.k].
See: “O sostoianii zaniatosti i migratsii naselenia v stranakh SNG,” Vestnik profsoiuzov, No. 5, 2011, p. 44.
See: “The Changing Union Movement,” 15 September, 2009, web-site of U.S. Department of State
[ipdigital.usembassy.gov].
See: V. Shcherbakov, “Dostoyny trud dolzehn byt v osnove strategii razvitia i modernizatsii,” Vestnik profsoiuzov,No. 4, 2011, p. 27.
“Serious Workers’ Rights Problems in Armenia,” 8 April, 2010, available at [www.ituc-csi.org].
“Georgia: Life Toll to Neo-liberal ‘Success’ Policies,” 4 February, 2011, available at [www.ituc-csi.org].
See: “Georgia’s Anti-Union Laws Prompt EU Probe Push,” 8 June, 2011, available at [www.ituc-csi.org]; “Geor-gia—Violation of the Fundamental Trade Union Rights of the Communication Workers’ Trade Union,” available at [www.ituc-csi.org].
See: “Sovet Federatsii profsoiuzov Kyrgyzstana ostro postavil voprosy aktivizatsii raboty,” Vestnik profsoiuzov,No. 3, 2011, p. 14.
See: G. Lortkipanidze, op. cit.
See: “Afghanistan,” available at [www.younionize.info].
[http://premier.gov.ru/eng/events/news/13844/].
See: “Meeting with Trade Union Leaders,” 15 December, 2010, available at [http://eng.kremlin.ru/news/1481#sel=].
See: “Profsoiuzy korporatsii “Arselormittal,” rabotaiushchie v Kazakhstane i Ukraine, dogovorilis deystvovat soo-bshcha,” 27 April, 2011, available at [www.vkp.ru].
See: The Global Unions “Washington Declaration.” Trade Union Statement to the G20 Crisis Summit in Wash-ington, 15 November, 2008; Global Unions “London Declaration”—Statement to the London G20 Summit; Global Unions “Pittsburgh Declaration.” Trade Union Statement to the Pittsburgh Summit—24-25 September, 2009, website of the Trade Union Advisory Committee (TUAC) [www.tuac.org].
See: “The Changing Union Movement,” 15 September, 2009, available at [iipdigital.usembassy.gov].
See, for example: “The Athens Manifesto,” web-site of the European Trade Union Confederation [www.etuc.org].
It is not easy to compare the region’s countries by the subsistence level since their approaches to the consumption
basket (its content and the consumption norms for food and non-food goods and services) differ.
See: M. Salikhov, “Soizmeriaem svoi trebovaniia s realnymi vozmozhnostiami strany,” Vestnik profsoiuzov, No. 4,2011, p. 46.
See: Labor Law of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, 7 February, 2007.
See: Ordinance No. 103 of the Presidium of the Revolutionary Council of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan to adopt the Labor Code , available at [www.ilo.org].
See: “New Project to Improve Afghan Labor Laws and Administration, Promote Decent Work,” 2 June, 2011,available at [www.ilo.org].
See: N.A. Nazarbaev, Vystuplenie na vneocherdnom XXI s’ezde Federatsii profsoiuzov Kazakhstana, 31 October,2005, available at [www.akorda.kz].
See: On Inadmissibility of the Use of Forced Labor of Children in Agriculture, Joint Statement of the Council of the Trade Union Federation of Uzbekistan, Association of the Farmers of Uzbekistan, and the Ministry of Labor and So-cial Protection of the Republic of Uzbekistan, 2 June, 2011, available at [www.jahonnews.u]
See: “Regionalny seminar dlia liderov proforganizatsiy neformalnogo sectora ekonomiki,” 31 August, 2010, avail-able at [www.vkp.ru]
See: “Sozdanie profsoiuznykh organizatsiy v chastnykh predpriiatiyakh malogo i srednego biznesa iavliatsia odnim iz aktualnykh voprosov dnia,” 15 November, 2010, available at [www.vkp.ru].
“Rekomendatsii kruglogo stola ‘O rabote chlenskikh organizatsiy VKP po uchastiiu v formirovanii gosudarstvennoy migratsionnoy politiki i zashchite trudiashchikhsia-migrantov,’” 28 February, 2011, available at [www.vkp.ru].
Ibidem.
See: “Profsoiuzy Azerbaidzhana i Sverdlovskoy oblasti obediniaiut usiliia v zashchite prav trudiashchikhsia-mi-grantov,” 17 March, 2011, available at [www.vkp.ru.]
There are no figures for Georgia, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, or Afghanistan (see: “Profsoiuzy Sodruzhestva v reshenii problemy okhrany truda,” September 2010, available at [www.vkp.ru]).
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