European Labour Rights at a Crossroads

Workshop of the transform! Working Group on Labour

Location:
transform! Coordination Office
Gusshausstr. 14/3A
Vienna

The crisis was used as a window of opportunity by European neoliberal elites and institutions – with the active complicity of member states – to impose further cuts in public expenditures, and to proceed to the dismantling of labour and social rights. This phenomenon, if more acute in so-called periphery countries, is however to be witnessed everywhere in Europe.

transform! has decided to dedicate more resources and energy to issues revolving around labour and trade unionism: European attacks on labour rights, trade unions’ responses to the casualization of precarious employment, the state of affairs with regard to the growing convergence between social movements and trade unions, alternatives capable of meeting social needs and technological evolutions, etc.

This workshop will be the first step towards the creation of a European network gathering social researchers and trade unionists capable of providing social movements and trade unions with latest infos with updated panoramas of the struggles against labour markets’ reforms across Europe.


Programme

Friday, 6 May

09:30 – 09:45: Welcoming Address and Introduction

  • Maxime Benatouil and Adoración Guamán

09:45 – 10:15: Growing Diversity in the European Trade Union Landscape

  • Steffen Lehndorff, Senior Researcher at the Institute for Work, Skills and Qualifications (IAQ), University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany

10:15 – 10:45: Collective Discussion

10:45 – 11:00: Coffee Break

11:00 – 12:30: Session 1 / Precariousness and Labour Law Reforms in the EU

  • Fernando Rocha, Fundación 1 de Mayo, Spain
  • Jakub Grzegorczyk, Workers’ Initiative, Poland
  • Andrea Lampresse, Labour Law researcher, Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Italy
  • Adoracion Guaman, Labour Law associate professor, University of Valencia, Spain
  • Maxime Benatouil, transform! europe, France

12:30 – 13:00: Collective Discussion

13:00 – 14:00: Lunch Break

14:00 – 14:30: Criminalisation of Union Action

  • Gianni Rinaldini, President of the Claudio Sabattini Foundation, Italy

14:30 – 15:00: Collective Discussion

15:00 – 16:30: Session 2 / Panorama of European Trade Unions’ Alternative Proposals

  • Sara Lafuente Hernandez, Researcher, Free University of Brussels, Spain
  • Bruno Estrada, Fundación 1 de Mayo, Spain
  • Reingard Zimmer, Labor Law Professor, Bern School of Economics and Law, Germany
  • Christian Pilichowski, Espaces Marx, France
  • Miguel Martinez Lucio, Professor of International HRM, Manchester University

16:30 – 17:00: Coffee Break

17:00 – 17:30: Collective Discussion

 

Saturday, 7 May

09:00 – 10:30: Session 3 / State of Convergence between Social Movements and Trade Unions

  • Sebastian Franco, Alter Summit, Belgium
  • Klara Cozlova, Gender Studies, Czech Republic
  • Albert Recio, Professor, Department of Applied Economics, Autonomous University of Barcelona, Catalunia
  • Dora Fonseca, Researcher at the Department of Sociology, University of Coimbra, Portugal

10:30 – 11:00: Collective Discussion

11:00 – 11:30: Session 4 / Fragmentation of Production and Action Strategy

  • Matteo Gaddi, Punto Rosso, Italy
  • Sigfrido Ramirez, transform! europe, Spain
  • Raul Lorente, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Valencia, Spain
  • Gilles Pansu, member of the employee representative committee of Altran, France

11:30 – 12:00: Collective Discussion

12:00 – 12:30: Lunch Break

12:30 – 13:30: General Conclusion and Discussion on the Next Steps