The Evolution and Challenges of Labor Movements

Under the current structure, labor organizations may only transform laborers into helpless postmodern neo-feudal slaves instead of making them independent and empowered.

It is coincidental that in the second week of May 1886, American pharmacist John Pemberton invented Coca-Cola in Atlanta. In the first week of the same month, May, in Chicago, a series of labor demonstrations in Haymarket Square were giving birth to International Labor Day. In support of the 'daily 8-hour work' decided in 1884 and legally enacted from May 1, 1886, labor demonstrations took place across America.

Among these demonstrations, the one in Chicago's Haymarket Square was led by staunch anarchists like August Spies, Albert Parsons, and Samuel Fielden, who rejected the state. The peaceful labor demonstrations of May 1 escalated by May 3 with police repression, and by May 4 in Haymarket Square, worker resistance, bomb explosions, and gunfire led to the deaths of about a dozen people.

Of the eight leaders of the Haymarket Square labor demonstration, Spies and Parsons, along with four others, were hanged by the American government. One committed suicide, and the rest received prison sentences. In solidarity with the Haymarket Square labor movement, socialist, communist, and many other organizations worldwide decided in the late 19th century (by the Second International) to celebrate May 1 as International Labor Day.

In the early days of the Industrial Revolution, when agricultural workers were moved to industries, organizing laborers was punishable. From the sporadic 8-hour slogan of Robert Owen, considered a utopian socialist, laborers gradually organized in the mid-19th century and appeared in the form of trade unions at the beginning of the 20th century.

The Chartist movement, which emerged during the Victorian era, and movements in Central and Western Europe around 1848, show that labor organizations also began to agitate politically against policies that affected workers' wages due to recurring economic crises like those in 1857–59. From the declaration in 1848, the International Workingmen's Association (First International) in 1863–64, to the 'Blanquist' Paris Commune of 1871, where thousands sacrificed their lives, the labor movement had developed to the point of overthrowing the government.

Against this backdrop, the devastation of the American Civil War, the Panic of 1873 caused by numerous global factors such as the Vienna Stock Exchange, the Suez Canal, and the demonetization of silver, and the subsequent Long Depression, Chicago became not only an industrial center but also a center of the American labor movement, with Haymarket Square giving the world the symbol of Labor Day.

The ripple effect of Haymarket Square was seen in Biratnagar almost 61 years later. Nepal's first labor movement occurred on March 4, 1947, at the Biratnagar Jute Mill with a capital of 1.6 million and the Morang Cotton Mill with a capital of 900,000. That labor movement, led by Girija Prasad Koirala, Manmohan Adhikari, and others, which succeeded in increasing wages by 15 percent and some benefits, appears to be the destiny of Nepali politics.

The labor movement, politically evaluated by BP Koirala, appears to have been entangled in disputes over the flag's color and name for the subsequent four to five years. Possibly, within the same organization named Biratnagar Mazdoor Sabha, parallel socialist and communist factions developed during that time. With the end of the Rana regime in 1951, Girija led the 'Nepal Trade Union Congress' and Manmohan led the 'All Nepal Trade Union Congress,' emerging as socialist and communist labor organizations.

However, after King Mahendra's introduction of the Panchayat system in 1960, labor organizations were also scattered. During the Panchayat era, the Nepal Labor Organization was formed within the system, and Nepal became a member of the International Labor Organization. Primarily, with the political change of 1990 and the Trade Union Act of 1992, the labor movement became institutionalized, open, and widespread. Today, with labor organizations affiliated with every party, we must evaluate how much the condition of laborers has changed compared to the state of Singhania's jute mill.

The statistics from the 1990–2000 decade, considered the golden decade of the Nepali labor movement, show a surprising picture. During that decade, the Gross Domestic Product was declining, unemployment was increasing in Nepal, and the number of people going for foreign employment, including to the Middle East, was gradually increasing. During that decade, more than a dozen state-owned corporations and industries, gifted by friendly nations to the Nepali people, were privatized at throwaway prices.

Although estimated at around 200 million, the Bhrikuti Paper Factory was acquired by Golchha for 120 million. The Harisiddhi Brick and Tile Industry was also sold for approximately 200 million, and the Bansbari Leather Shoe Factory for about 20 million. Thus, while about 63 state-owned corporations and industries existed before the Panchayat era in 1990, only 36 remained by 2007, with the number further decreasing.

This was a plunder of national assets and workers' employment in the name of privatization. For example, Golchha acquired the Bhrikuti Paper Factory in Gaidakot, Nawalpur, with 60 bighas of land and a daily production capacity of 8 tons of paper, for a pittance. In a short period thereafter, land prices in Gaidakot skyrocketed, from 10–20–40 lakh per kattha to around 1 crore per kattha near the highway.

Even at an average of 50–60 lakh per kattha, with 20 kattha per bigha, it is hundreds of times more profitable for Golchha to develop plots of land than to operate the industry. When a parasitic capitalist class, like sucking leeches, dominates, workers lose their livelihoods, and labor power migrates.

While privatization was highly promoted by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, it is regrettable that leaders born from the historic labor movement of Biratnagar made decisions detrimental to the working class. It is a cause for concern that labor organizations did not resist, questioning which class these top-down policies served, and instead acted merely as party enforcers. The fact that the fundamental character of labor organizations has not changed in the years since, even up to 2020, raises the question of whether our labor movements are suffering from 'force of habit'.

Statistics show that approximately 1.3 million families (29 percent of the population) are landless. While the bottom 20 percent of poor families own only 3 percent of arable land, the top 7 percent of wealthy families control 31 percent of arable land. Additionally, 53 percent of farmers own less than 0.5 hectares of land. In this context, pursuing economic liberalization has led to a vicious cycle of an unproductive education system that produces employees and scribes but does not teach skills and entrepreneurship for earning a living. Consequently, in about two decades, around half a crore Nepali youths have gone to the Middle East, Malaysia, and other countries as laborers.

Due to a lack of skilled labor, many have taken up difficult, dirty, and dangerous jobs, officially bringing in around 40–50 kharba rupees. The remittances sent from abroad annually now account for about 25–30 percent of the Gross Domestic Product. However, this amount is primarily spent in unproductive sectors, leading to an 'economy of eating instant noodles instead of corn and beans and watching TikTok'.

Immediately after the recent political change, a 'broker merchant class' emerged, acting as intermediaries for capital, raw materials, and information. This class, in the name of operating industries, does not produce goods itself but obtains 'franchises' to import finished goods from abroad and only perform 'bottling and packaging' in Nepal. The main objective of this class is to control the banking, import-export, and overall financial system and information, influence political leadership, and earn maximum profits in a short time. Consequently, even the savings of the general public, earned through hard work at home and abroad, are controlled by them through banks.

They invest in non-productive sectors for higher profits according to their interests. And when problems arise, they create a cycle where they receive concessions funded by the public's taxes. In such a cycle, the working class suffers the most. However, it is not surprising that the major labor organizations, claiming over 1.8 million organized members, remain silent while witnessing all this. Is it not necessary to break this cycle?

The COVID-19 pandemic has clarified that there is no theoretical difference between laborers at IBM, Google, Apple, Benz, farms in Portugal, construction in Qatar, or brick kilns in Bhaktapur. After this pandemic lockdown, we will likely face a situation of an empty country and weakened laborers. It can be predicted that this shifting complex economic burden will again fall on the same weakened laborers, which could be extremely explosive.

Currently, statistics show that the economically active population above 15 years of age in the country is around two crore. Of these, approximately 10 lakh are fully unemployed, while another approximately one crore are engaged in informal subsistence-level activities.

Does a laborer remain a laborer for life, or can they also become an owner?

Are the processes of a 'labor leader, a shareholder in a casino without labor, a dance bar owner, a sand contractor of Trishuli, a trafficker of workers, an accomplice of human traffickers, a prime minister's advisor, and becoming prime minister, and a common laborer becoming a small capitalist owner through their own labor value' the same or different? This question seems profound.

Although laborers and squatters are equally angry today, they have only broken-strap slippers in their hands, not guns. In the upcoming elections, labor organizations under their command will try to affiliate the laborers, who are currently walking and crying on foot, into their organizations in some way. And ultimately, the rulers seem confident that the political rights of those laborers will come under their control.

Under that system, it appears we must silently witness the situation where people like Dugad become ministers, and groups like Chaudhary Group and Ncell do not have to pay billions in revenue through the political rights of labor hijacked by the party. Therefore, under the current structure, labor organizations have the potential to transform laborers into helpless postmodern neo-feudal slaves rather than making them independent and empowered.

Therefore, should we unconditionally hand over our political rights to a party, or should we struggle? Should we walk barefoot and helpless in times of crisis on the roads we ourselves built within this structure, or should we forcefully overthrow it?

This is the important question today.

Happy International Labor Day to all!

(This article was published in the magazine 'Majdoor' before the passing of Swanam Sathi in 2020.)