Sunday, April 02, 2006

ILO Panel Calls for Civil Servants' Right to Strike

"An international labor committee has recommended that the South Korean government guarantee civil servants’ right to organize and minimize restrictions on their right to strike."

Whether teachers would avail themselves of this right if it were to be guaranteed is of course another question. Coming (as I do) from a work culture where the (convincing) threat of collective action is a time-honoured route to concessions at the negotiating table, I sometimes wonder how the KTU earns credibility with the Ministry of Education ... is it the weekly newspapers the union publishes and distributes? the conferences it organizes? the offices it maintains? the allies it finds in "civil society?"

How any of these, important as they are, would be perceived as even a marginal threat to government schemes, I can't say.

Give me a picket line or give me nothing!

No comments: