Global Labor Strategies

China's New Draft Arbitration Law

With China increasingly setting wages and working conditions for workers the world over, the ripple effects from changes in Chinese labor law are likely to be felt in each of our home countries. So head's up: new Chinese labor legislation is in the works.

The latest draft law concerns labor dispute mediation and arbitration.  Since Chinese workers lack the right to strike, arbitration has been one of the few institutional ways for workers to address grievances with their employers. But the current system is failing, triggering an increasing number of worker protests and social unrest.

The new draft was submitted to the National People’s Congress for its first reading on August 26, 2007.  It comes on the heels of the Labour Contract Law passed last August, which extended an array of basic rights for Chinese workers—including protections for temp workers, just-cause firing provisions, etc.

The arbitration law is designed to address a number of government concerns.  According to the China Daily, PRC figures reveal that “labor dispute cases in China are continuously increasing in recent years. Statistics show that labor dispute arbitration organizations at various levels dealt with 1.72 million labor dispute cases involving 5.32 million employees from 1987 to the end of 2005, with a growth rate of 27.3 percent annually.”

Philippine Toyota Workers – an Update

Almost a year ago we reported on the struggle of a group of auto workers employed by Toyota’s subsidiary in the Philippines. Their actions involved some highly innovative approaches to the problems globalization.

The backstory: In March, 2001 the Toyota Motor Philippines Corporation Workers Association (TMPCWA) won a certification election granting them the right to be recognized as sole bargaining agent for the rank and file workers of the Toyota Philippines Corporation.  Toyota subsequently unlawfully dismissed 233 workers, including the entire union executive committee.

Americans Abroad: The Mis-Adventures of AmCham in Vietnam

With President Bush in Hanoi attending the ASEAN annual conference, we decided to do a little digging to see what the American Chamber of Commerce has been up to in Vietnam.  Surely AmCham and the corporations they represent—including NIKE, Coca-Cola, Fed-Ex, Pfizer, and Exxon—have been living up their promises to the US Congress and the American people to raise labor standards and wages in Vietnam. 

Well, not quite…

In September 2005 the Vietnamese government called on foreign companies to increase workers’ minimum wages, with the largest increases targeted towards the poorest workers in the semi-rural areas and small cities.

According to Michael Karadjis writing for the ASEAN Focus Group based at the Australian National University,

“This government decision had come about due to a demand for a minimum 40 per cent increase by the Vietnam General Confederation of Labour (VGCL), the country's peak trade union body.  [In response], many foreign investors asked the government to defer the wage rise until after the Tet (Lunar New Year) holiday, which began on 28 January 2006, because they 'couldn't afford' to pay the wage rise and also pay the Tet bonus. The Tet bonus is the equivalent of a thirteenth month salary that Vietnamese workers are legally entitled to. The government, thus, left it up to the bosses and workers to bargain over when it would be implemented before Tet...

Feeling they had waited long enough, workers downed tools with the full knowledge that they had the law, the open sympathy of most Vietnamese, the discreet sympathy of the government and the active support of the official trade union leadership on their side.”