The ILO: An Agency for Globalization?

Abstract

The International Labour Organization, set up in 1919 to develop and promote labour standards, is at a crucial point. It has preached that labour is not a commodity and in 1969 received the Nobel Peace Prize. Since then it has run into trouble. This article considers how the ILO has failed to come to terms with the Global Transformation, seeing it as trying to play three roles -a standard-setter, a technical assistance agency and a knowledge generatorwithout developing the professional capacity to do so. The big question is whether the ILO could become an effective development agency given the changing character of work and labour in globalizing labour markets and its antiquated governance structure.

Global governance of labour migration: From ‘management’ of migration to an integrated rights-based approach

“…Whether or not opening up channels to domestic and migrant worker organisations constitutes a breakup of the sacrosanct tripartite structure of the ILO by turning this into a consistent feature of the organisation is yet to be seen. But it is a step in the right direction, as pointed out by critics who have argued for the ILO's institutional renewal and inclusion of non-traditional types of workers (Standing 2008), who make up the majority of workers. In this way, the ILO would also become relevant to the situation of workers in the global South (Sen 2000).…”

“…This trend is reflected in the weakened position of the ILO, the key player in the upholding of migrants' rights in their role as workers (Standing 2008). The organisation's historical success in promoting labour standards can be attributed in part to its tripartite structure, 2 which has allowed for significant input into the standardsetting process from two specific non-state actors: employers and trade unions.…”

“…Pressure from within includes the lack of inclusion of organisations beyond the traditional employer-employee nexus that has historically emerged from the specific experience of European labourism, which has led to the exclusion of other non-union labour organisations (migrant and non-migrant) (Standing 2008). There are also new stateowned processes of deliberation 3 that occur outside the UN framework and which pose direct competition to standard-setting organisations like the ILO.…”

“…Moreover, the International Labour Organization (ILO) as the central standard-setting international organisation (IO) in the realm of labour (migrant and non-migrant)-and, arguably, the only global institution with the potential to combine migration with labour governance-has occupied a marginal position within the emerging migration governance in terms of its ability to assert influence on the direction of the current policy debate (Standing 2008). This may appear somewhat surprising given the fact that migration is linked, directly or indirectly, to the world of work: more than 50 per cent of the 214 million international migrants today are economically active and, together with their families, migrant workers make up over 90 per cent of this total (ILO 2013: 3).…”

“…This is why insights from political sociology-a component missing from existing work on global migration governance (but see Grugel and Piper 2007)-are vital. Recognition that, as a policy field, international migration for employment requires not only bilateral but also effective global regulation has come very late when compared with other issue areas that have been subject to global governance for some time, such as trade, health and finance ( Jönsson and Tallberg 2010;Betts 2011;Koser 2010). Yet, international migration is among the key features of economic globalisation today (Standing 2008), and, as a truly global phenomenon, migration implicates most, if not all, countries in the world in one form or another, as major migrant senders and/or receivers.…”