Little to cheer about.

(From Philippine Daily Inquirer)

THE CELEBRATION of Labor Day today is cast against the background of more threatening concerns generated by the SARS epidemic, its economic fall-out as well as that of the war in Iraq that is just winding down.

Labor has not done well since the economic slowdown that followed the 1997 Asian financial crisis, and this year's celebration only serves to throw the spotlight on the working class' disadvantages rather than its gains. There is little therefore for organized labor to cheer as its members march in the streets to mark, especially in the Philippines, the 100th anniversary of the first march by Filipino workers of the Union Obrera Democratica Filipina to Malacanang Palace to demand the right to unionize from the American governor general.

After a hundred years of unionism, fewer than 10 percent of the workforce of 37 million are unionized, and of the three million union members, only 500,000 are covered by collective bargaining agreements. These figures illustrate the inherent weakness of unions. Reflecting this weakness are the facts that the moderate unions are not demanding higher wage packages and are content merely with non-wage concessions, and that the left-wing unions are spreading out their grievances from union benefits toward political issues such as political freedom and human rights or the impact of trade liberalization on labor.

Compounding these is the fact that disgruntled political groups have jumped into the populist carriage of May Day, with the threat of staging demonstrations that would revive the inflammatory atmosphere of the May Day attack on Malacanang two years ago by cohorts of the toppled Estrada administration. From evidence, staging Edsa 4 is a fantasy. Conditions that fanned May 1, 2001, do not exist, and the police can very well handle disturbances from these groups.

But trade unions have more serious problems other than being disadvantaged by trade liberalization, globalization and the fall-out from the recent economic shocks. The most blatant attack on unionism came recently from the proposal emanating from the Filipino Chinese Chamber of ...