Organizing ‘Spaces of Hope’: Union Formation by Indian Garment Workers
| Date | 01 September 2013 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8543.2012.00917.x |
| Published date | 01 September 2013 |
| Author | Jean Jenkins |
Organizing ‘Spaces of Hope’: Union
Formation by Indian Garment Workers
Jean Jenkins
Abstract
This article concerns union formation among female garment workers in Ban-
galore, in the southern state of Karnataka, India. It analyses a case where a
category of workers dismissed by established national unions as impossible to
organize came to form their own women’s movement and thence their own
union. The case highlights the crucial role of a sustained, flexible approach
towards organizing at the micro level, in the mobilization of vulnerable workers
employed in highly competitive labour markets.
1. Introduction
As the gap widens between the beneficiaries of economic liberalization and
those who labour in fragmented, highly competitive, international markets
for meagre returns, the working poor seem everywhere to be with us, and
contemporary trade unionism is challenged in representing their interests.
This article focuses on the context prevailing in the Indian setting where,
alongside its ‘economic miracle’, millions of workers continue to struggle
against the effects of poverty and poor working conditions (e.g. Ghosh 2009;
Hammer 2010; Harvey 2007: 76; Hill 2009; Kuruvilla and Ranganathan
2008; Taylor and Bain 2003). Despite hardship, such workers do not neces-
sarily recognize India’s established national unions as part of the remedy for
their ills (Hammer 2010; Noronha and D’Cruz 2009; Taylor et al. 2009).
However, this does not mean that workers are not organizing. This article
focuses on an example of local activism by female garment workers in the city
of Bangalore, in the southern state of Karnataka, India.
This is a case of union formation by workers unused to organization.
It grew out of grass-roots activism, sponsored and supported by a small
non-governmental organization (NGO), Cividep-India (Cividep). Labour
activists, themselves drawn from the ranks of garment workers, began their
Jean Jenkins is at Cardiff University.
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British Journal of Industrial Relations doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8543.2012.00917.x
51:3 September 2013 0007–1080 pp. 623–643
© John Wiley & Sons Ltd/London School of Economics 2012. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd,
9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.
organizing by focusing on women’s domestic concerns, offering practical
support in pursuit of greater social justice, both inside and outside the work-
place. Over a period of years, this organizing activity gave rise to a women’s
social movement, Munnade, which led to the formation of an independent
trade union, namely the Garment and Textile Workers’ Union (GATWU).1
The majority of the garment workers involved in this movement were female,
being typical of the ‘new working classes’ of the global South in originating
from more rural environments, being generally new to industrialization and
unfamiliar with unionization (Moody 1997: 201). Through organization, the
women concerned have gained a vitally important collective ‘space for hope’
(Harvey 2000) in what might otherwise have been a more hopeless world.
The present case contributes in a number of ways to findings from other
studies of organizing in newly industrializing settings (among them, Bhatt
2006; Caraway 2007; Gunawardana 2007; Hale 2005: 40–68; Hammer 2010;
Lynch 2007; Pangsapa 2007; Rock 2001; Taylor et al. 2009). First, it high-
lights the value and necessity of a ‘pre-union’ concept as a pathway to more
systematic organizing and a means of addressing the varying needs of unor-
ganized constituencies of labour (Bhatt 2006; Gunawardana 2007: 96–7;
Pangsapa 2007: 84; see also Fine 2006: 247). Second, it emphasizes the
importance of engaging with the whole of workers’ lives beyond the work-
place, and understanding their living spaces and social structures as crucial
aspects of the opportunity context for mobilization (Gunawardana 2007: 91;
Hammer 2010; see also Kelly 1998: 40). Third, the case highlights that, in
addition to pursuit of statutory rights, the local union used the complex
triangular relationship that exists between factory owners, the brands and
their consumers as a source of leverage (Esbenshade 2004: 54; see also Locke
2009). Finally, while the case demonstrates the crucial importance of local
leadership and grass-roots activity for mobilization at the micro level, it also
emphasizes the need for wider external alliances and networks of support as
essential adjuncts to local organizing, in order to maximize the chances of
successful, sustainable mobilization (Taylor et al. 2009: 39).
The article comprises four main sections. It begins with an overview of
the garment sector and challenges to organization. Section 3 outlines the
research methods. Section 4 considers the research findings in four subsec-
tions: respectively, the garment worker’s status inside and outside the work-
place, the pre-union concept, the move into unionization, and finally, union
issues and outcomes. Section 5 concludes by summarizing the findings,
and emphasizes the necessity of tailored, flexible approaches to micro-
mobilization, integrated with macro-level support structures, when organiz-
ing those previously unused to collective organization.
2. The garment sector — location, employment practices and challenges
to organization
The ‘lived experience’ of a garment worker — anywhere in the world — is
most likely to be defined by being classed as a low-paid, low-skilled, easily
624 British Journal of Industrial Relations
© John Wiley & Sons Ltd/London School of Economics 2012.
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