[asia-apec 504] Summary of the Panel Discussion (part 2 of 2)

[Roberto Verzola]

Second Part of the Summary of the Panel Discussion

ICT and the Trade Unions
   35.  Panellists identified several challenges faced by unions moving
into the information age.  First, unions are called upon to develop
appropriate policies and positions with regard to the introduction of
ICT and the new patterns of work and work organization it brings in its
wake.  They constantly confront the security/flexibility debate, both in
terms of labour law and collective bargaining, and feel that the way
forward lies in information, consultation and negotiation so that
changes are brought about by agreement and workers' concerns are
addressed in tandem with enterprises' survival strategies.  ICT itself
offers an effective means of making enterprises, and their strategies,
more transparent.  Competition and the consequent interest in
ICT-enabled productivity and efficiency, has led them to work with
management on improving performance in return for an equitable share of
the rewards.  They have had to become more sophisticated at analysing
employer performance, but find their task facilitated by ICT which makes
information more readily available.  The introduction and use of ICT has
itself become a subject for dialogue and collective agreement.  COSATU,
for example, has demanded that all issues concerning information
technology be negotiated with the unions before decisions are taken. 
Other unions are supporting collective agreements with norms and
guidelines, the FIET guidelines on telework being a case in point.  It
was suggested that without joint agreement between business and labour
on the full range of measures, policies and practices concerning the
implementation of ICT it risked becoming a management weapon against
labour.
   36.  A second challenge is that of ensuring that union perspectives
are integrated into the gamut of broader ICT issues.  For example,
COSATU has called for unions to be involved in the  national innovation
system: i.e. in South Africa's R&D foresight programme, and in all
policy issues relating to ICT and to technology more broadly.
   37.  A third challenge is the necessity of organizing a labour market
with a changing profile.  This task is not facilitated by the fact that,
with membership dispersed into hundreds of small, often independent,
enterprises, bargaining units are becoming smaller, increasing the cost
of servicing members and of recruitment.  Unions are responding by
adapting model agreements to particular circumstances and offering
individualized services, especially for grievances, training, and
discount financial services.
   38.  The greatest challenge is perhaps the use of ICT by unions as
part of their own strategy to adapt and improve their services to their
members 'as they themselves face changes which have the potential to
improve the conditions of work and life but which could also marginalize
those unable to keep up with the pace of the revolution'.

ICT as a Tool for Development
   39.  The principle of sustainable development should underlie the use
of ICT to promote economic growth and social equity in developing
countries. The growing trend in the international relocation of work,
and especially of information processing, offered new opportunities for
developing countries.  However, for ICT-facilitated growth to be
sustainable, developing countries must themselves take the initiative to
create particular market niches which made best use of their comparative
advantages.  The lack of capital, the requisite skills, and  basic
infrastructure hampers developing countries in making the fullest use of
ICT's potential as a tool for development, and its potential for
employment creation could not be fully realized without appropriate
policy interventions from governments, educational institutions and
corporations.
   40.  While  ICT offers substantial opportunities for informal sector
activities and significant livelihood options, these are not adequately
reflected in current approaches to jobs and work, or in their
institutional underpinnings.  The latter included job classification
systems, wage structures, career paths, industrial relations systems and
social security.  It was suggested that ICT offered an unique
opportunity to reconsider the future of work and to design the best
approach to it.
   41.  Through its impact on the way work is organized and distributed
ICT affects the lives of most people, because they are either included
in, or excluded from, the emerging information society.  We were
reminded that enormous numbers of workers, especially in the developing
countries were untouched by ICT and were, consequently, severely
neglected in policy-making at national and international levels.  Better
ways had to be found to understand and describe their livelihood
systems, how technology impacted on them, and how public policy could
more intelligently help them. 
   42.  ICT's impact on development was an issue which had resonance in
regions or localities in the developed countries.  The problem of
lagging regions in leading economies (LRLE) appeared to be caused by the
use of ICT to (re)centralize work processes and services to metropolitan
headquarters to the detriment of the local economy and of its skills
base.  The consequent out-migration, especially of young workers, with
technological skills, binds LRLEs into a vicious circle in which local
labour shortages and unemployment go hand in hand.  For LRLEs, as for 
developing countries, the idea that 'getting the factors worked out
right' will promote their development into new Silicon Valleys may
actually distort policy-making and give rise to expectations which mask
or exacerbate local conditions.  One suggested response to this problem
was to create a 'bubble development', structurally isolated from
surrounding economic, social and institutional conditions, at least in
its initial, formative stage.  However, given the experience of export
processing zones, both the long-term sustainability of such bubbles, and
their eventual (and highly desirable) spill-over into the local economy
is uncertain.
   43.  Political will and bureaucratic imagination appeared to be
important preconditions for the redistribution of ICT-oriented
employment opportunities to peripheries, be they localities or
countries.  Could the Italian industrial district model, based on
co-operation between disparate groups, which could include the corporate
sector, trade unions, government and academic institutions, be an
alternative to 'bubble development' which incorporates both imagination
and will?  The infrastructure and community development programmes
undertaken by peri-urban and rural communities in South Africa, with the
support and participation of the corporate sector, academic institutions
and NGO's seem very similar to industrial districts in structure and
functioning, if not in goals and appear to be contributing to the
building of information-based local economies. 

Policies, Strategies and Governance
   44.  Panellists suggested that all levels of society should take a
more active role in preparing for work in an information economy.  While
the main responsibility for policies in support of ICT-led growth lay
with the governments, greater cooperation between trade unions and
employers, as key actors in the labour field, was also emphasized. 
Other groups identified included:  educational institutions, community
development organizations, other non-governmental organizations
dedicated to improving the living and working conditions of workers, and
communities of the self-employed.  It was also suggested that
international organisations such as the World Bank, the ILO, the UNDP
and UNESCO had to play a greater role in ensuring that the gap between
countries, and between people within countries, did not widen.
   45.  Questions were raised concerning appropriate transition
programmes and policies which could shape inclusionary strategies which
benefitted all sections of the economy and of society, and not just
those with the resources to optimize the opportunities which ICT
presented.  Two areas (education and infrastructure) were consistently
mentioned as being vital to the creating an appropriate enabling
environment for the development and deployment of ICT. 
   46.  While education and training were identified as key
preconditions for access to, and survival in, the 'new' jobs, some
panellists appeared to feel that traditional systems had to be reviewed
and revised to meet new needs.  It was suggested that the constant
innovation necessary for competitive survival required a high level of
'permanent education' wherein primary education was designed to create a
base for continuous, lifelong learning, flexibility and multi-skilling. 
Employability, rather than job-specific skills was the desired result. 
If such education becomes the precondition for access to jobs and work,
the gap between nations and between citizens within nations could widen
disastrously, in the short-term at least.
   47.  It was suggested that even if education was a major tool in
preserving jobs and helping people to find (or create) new job
opportunities, it had limitations, at least as far as the lower (and
older) echelons of the existing workforce were concerned.  Some
panellists argued that it could  be difficult to retrain some groups of
unemployed into new jobs which require higher education, new skills and,
most importantly, a different mind-set.  The suggestion that children
show greater facility in acquiring computer-based skills than their
parents and grandparents, raised the questions of whether there would be
a gradual emergence of a two-tier labour force divided along age lines
and whether the existence of such a divide would require dual, or
parallel, educational and training policies which focus primarily on the
creation of a computer-literate new generation while applying *band-aid*
policies to the existing labour force.  The involvement of employers,
trade unions and other groups in shaping educational policies was
recommended by several panellists.
   48.  Some panellists suggested that current labour market
institutions were not conducive to the advent of ICT.  Arguing that the
labour market was over-regulated and did not promote entrepreneurship,
or encourage self-employment, they advocated lower levels of state
intervention which would allow ICT to choose its own pace and direction,
and bring about a shift toward more creative, higher-quality jobs. 
Others stressed that regulation was essential to protect workers whose
jobs were made more volatile by ICT and that labour standards should not
be allowed to fall victim to arguments in favour of untrammelled
flexibility.  Still others contended that more bureaucratic involvement
was needed to ensure the redistribution of employment beyond existing
metropolitan catchment areas and that the lack of political will
hampered the realization of the benefits of new patterns of work
supported by ICT.  The absence of significant public intervention in the
form of education and training, enterprise incubation, small-scale
financing, and directed procurement and enterprise support were thought
to be among the factors most likely to hinder those countries and
localities which were currently outside the ICT intensive economy from
finding a role within it. 
   49.  Panellists felt that conditions for successful policy
implementation had to be locally created, but that knowledge of local
conditions was inadequate.  More information-sharing was needed between
governments and business, and between them and other groups in civil
society, notably organized labour.  Joint policy-planning at the micro
level could provide one vehicle for such sharing.  The same was true for
planning at the national level and we were reminded that co-operation
between all stake-holders was vital in setting the rules and parameters
of this new environment.  
   50.  It is uncertain whether ICT will lead to a simplification of
institutional structures, or whether the problem of regulation will be
simply transferred from the national to the international arena.  A
trade union panellist envisaged a more active role for the ILO and
recommended the creation of a tripartite WTO which would be more
sensitive to the needs of workers.
   51.  As business, and particularly MNCs, were recognized as being the
principle actors in the development and spread of ICT, it was argued
that they had a role, and even an obligation, to use it in socially
optimal ways. It was noted that while business had become the most
powerful institution on the global scene, wielding greater power and
controlling greater resources than many states, it did not have a
tradition (as did the state and the church) of taking responsibility for
society as a whole.  However, with the faltering of the 'guiding
invisible hand', comprising the consensus of overarching meaning and
values built into the concept of capitalism and free enterprise, it was
hoped that business would adopt such a tradition.
   52.  Finally, it was thought that short-termed technological
determinism, based on downsizing and reducing labour costs, appeared to
be giving way to efforts to raise labour productivity through investment
in skills development, infrastructure and R & D.  Supplemented by the
optimal use of 'the productivity-raising potential of good labour
standards' and co-operative forms of work organization, this trend could
represent the beginning of a 'high road' approach to development in
which 'human capital, new technology, and work organization become fully
interlocked into creating growth, competitiveness, employment and better
working conditions'.  ICT itself would afford the necessary room for
manoeuvre.

ILO, Geneva, June 1998