A política internacional e a atuação da Central Única dos Trabalhadores no Mercosul

Abstract

Globalization and regionalism are simultaneous and complementary processes which have introduced a great challenge to the labour movement. In fact, the trade unions have been constrained to overcome the national boundaries within which they habitually operate in construction of international policies and practices in order to face a new stage of capitalist expansion which is characterised by the productive and financial transnationality and by the dominance of the neoliberal ideology. An analysis of the international policies and performance of the Central Única dos Trabalhadores (CUT/Brazil) in the integration process of the MERCOSUL has demonstrated the particular configuration of the social forces which represent capital and workers in the region. It has also allowed for the identification of how the labour movement has operated and which factors have influenced it. Labour relations in the MERCOSUL have been characterised by the struggle between the classes, which reproduces the hegemonic processes which occur in the civil societies of each of the states involved in the integration process. The hegemony of the capital in the MERCOSUL is characterised by the commercial logic which has guided the integration process and by the attribution of a weak institutional role to the trade unions. Since the latter have occupied subordinate positions and have been based on small politics , they have faced strong resistance from governments and the private sector in accepting their proposals for an increase in the integration of the social and labour dimensions. The countless proposals which have been formulated by the CUT (one of the most representative unions in the region) and by the regional syndicate movements (which are articulated by the Coordenadora de Centrais Sindicais do Cone Sul ) can be considered as significant advancements in the social and working spheres of the MERCOSUL. However, it should be noted that the proposals which have been presented by the CUT and the CCSCS, although devised within the capitalist order, have not managed to break the barriers of governments and the private sector in the MERCOSUL. This demonstrates that the syndicate movements have played a submissive role within the integration process, which, in turn, reflects their weakened role within the nations that constitute the block. In these nations, the capitalist classes have continuously managed to preserve their hegemony. It has been noted, in fact, that amidst the underlying clash between the social classes, the syndicate movements have not managed to break the bonds of commitment which have existed between governments and the private sector; they have not, either, managed to counteract the resistance of the latter two against the expansion of the social dimension of the MERCOSUL.