TRM 431.01 INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS WRITTEN REPORT " LABOR RIGHTS"

8/6/2019 TRM 431.01 INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS WRITTEN REPORT " LABOR RIGHTS"

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CONTENTS

Labor Rights ___________________________________ 2

International Governmental Organizations & Non-Governmental Organizations For

Labor Rights____________________________________3

Labor Rights in Turkey____________________________4

Tourism and Hospitality Industry____________________5

Labor Rights in Tourism in Turkey___________________7

1


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LABOR RIGHTS

Labor rights are the protection of workers and respect for human life at workplaces.

These rights are set of legal rights very related to human rights and regulate relations between

workers and employers and these can be obtained under the law. Some essential parts of labor

rights are right to unionize, right to equal pay for equal work, right to work safety. Especially,

Unionization is very important weapon for workers because a single individual might not be

able to get what (s) he expects. However, Unions take advantage of collective bargaining for

better working conditions, better salaries etc. in favor of labors.

Throughout the history, Labor right issues always have taken place in order for people

to gain more interests at their workplace. For example, during the Middle Ages Peasants have

tried to express how bad the conditions and demanded better working environment and

wages. Since workers were discriminated (even today) and unequal conditions made Peasants

revolt.

With the hectic advancements in mechanics during 18th century, Industrial Revolution

started to change society. People started to move cities from rural areas to join the revolution

and capitalist system began to exploit workers, only profit went to the factory owners,

business owners. Workers had no rights. During this period, Karl Marx was one of the

supporters of Labor rights. Because he believed that an ideal society only could be achieved

by labors. During this period, In England abuse of child labor has increase and a law about

child labors was legislated in order to solve child worker situation. For instance, under the age

of 9 cannot work, 9 -13 can work 8 hours a day and 13-18 can work 12 hours in a day.

Labor Unions have played an important role to gain more rights. Growth of Labor

Unions actually resulted from enhancements of industry in 1920s and in 1930s Great

Depression led Unions come to power. In 1919, International Labor Organization was

founded under the League of Nations and later joined United Nations. It has vital role to apply

labor rights and tried to standardize labor rights practices all over the world. One of the

important incidents is that in May 1, 1946 200 thousand people stop working in order to get 8-

hours work in a day. The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial

Organizations (AFL-CIO) is a national federation of labor unions in the United States and this

contributed to May 1 a lot. AFL-CIO is an organization composed primarily of craft unions

founded in 1886, and the CIO, a federation of industrial unions founded in 1938.

Since labor right issue is very associated with human rights, in United NationDeclaration of Human Rights, importance of workers stated and two articles supported labor

rights. These statements are;


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Article 23

Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favorable

conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.

Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.

Everyone who works has the right to just and favorable remuneration ensuring for himselfand his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by

other means of social protection.

Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.

Article 24

Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working

hours and periodic holidays with pay.

International Governmental Organizations & Non-Governmental Organizations For

Labor Rights

International Labor Rights Organization (ILO)

The ILO was created in 1919, as part of the Treaty of Versailles that ended World War I, to

reflect the belief that universal and lasting peace can be accomplished only if it is based on

social justice. The main aims of the ILO are to promote rights at work, encourage decent

employment opportunities, enhance social protection and strengthen dialogue on work-related

issues. Also, it has a unique structure among international organizations. It is an

intergovernmental organization but its decision making bodies are tripartite. This means that

all the ILO bodies, with only few exceptions are composed of representatives of workers and

employers as well as governments. In the governing body of the ILO, governments have 50%

of the vote, employers and workers 25% each. Also, each member state of ILO is required tosend to the annual International Labor Conference two government delegates, and one

representative organization of employers and of workers.

In 1946, ILO became a specialized agency of the newly formed United Nations. Now, it has

183 country members including Turkey. Turkey became a member of ILO in 1932 and ILO

Ankara Office opened in 1976. The ILO aims to combat child labor, to increase women and

youth employment, to strengthen social dialogue and eliminate informal economy in Turkey

and all around the world.


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Today, ILO provides international labor standards, make official meetings, events and

campaigns. It develops projects for Decent Work. Also it gives training and provides

publications, statistics and databases.

International Labor Rights Forum (ILRF)

ILRF is an advocacy organization dedicated to achieving just and humane treatment for

workers worldwide. It is a nongovernmental organization which committed to ending the

problems of child labor, forced labor and other abusive practices. ILRF promotes enforcement

of labor rights through public education and mobilization, research, litigation, legislation and

collaboration with labor, government and business groups.

ILRF has many successful projects. One of them is the Cocoa Campaign. They long

maintained a public awareness and advocacy campaign to end the child labor in the cocoa

farms of West Africa. In 2009, ILRF helped to finally convince the chocolate giants, to make

a commitment to Fair Trade Certified Cocoa Standards

Labor Rights in Turkey

The labor rights issue in Turkey directly connected with labor unions. There are four bigunions in Turkey. These can be listed as: Confederation of Public Employees Trade Unions

(KESK), Confederation of Revolutionary Trade Unions (DSK), Confederation of Turkish

Real Trade Unions (HAK-) and Confederation of Turkish Trade Unions (TRK-) KESK

and DSK attends the annual International Labor Conference every year. In addition, these

four unions are the member of European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC). Also, from the

governmental perspective, Turkeys Ministry of Labor and Social Security cooperates with

international governmental organizations

ETUC

Etuc exists to speak with a single voice, on behalf of the common interests of workers at

European level and founded in 1973. Today, it represents 82 trade union organizations in 36

European countries plus 12 industry based federation.


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TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY

International Labor Organizations for Hospitality Industry:

UNWTO: The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO/OMT) is a specialized agency of the

United Nations and the leading international organization in the field of tourism. It serves as a

global forum for tourism policy issues and a practical source of tourism know-how. UNWTO

has projects and campaigns for tourism employees as well as for tourism development.

The Organization encourages the implementation of the Global Code of Ethics for Tourism,

with a view to ensuring that member countries, tourist destinations and businesses maximize

the positive economic, social and cultural effects of tourism and fully reap its benefits, while

minimizing its negative social and environmental impacts. Under global code of ethics for

tourism there is also an article about labor rights which highlights the fundamental rights of

salaried and self-employed workers.

IUF: The International Union of Food, Agricultural, Hotel, Restaurant, Catering, Tobacco

and Allied Workers' Associations (IUF) is an international federation of trade unions

representing workers employed in

agriculture and plantations

the preparation and manufacture of food and beverages

hotels, restaurants and catering services

all stages of tobacco processing

The IUF is currently composed of 336 trade unions in 120 countries representing a combined

representational membership of over 12 million workers (including a financial membership of

2.7 million). It is based in Geneva, Switzerland.

Tourism Concern: Tourism Concern fights exploitation in tourism. They are an independent,

non-industry based, UK charity. They have a membership of almost 900 and work with

partners in over 20 destination countries to ensure that tourism always benefits local people.

They have studies for the improvement of tourism workers conditions. For example, theyhave a campaign namely putting tourism to rights. In that campaign their aim is calling on
http://www.unwto.org/ethics/index.phphttp://www.unwto.org/ethics/index.php


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governments and industry to more to respect and protect the human rights of destination

communities and industry employees.

Labor Rights in Hospitality Industry

Main challenges to labor rights are listed as flexibilization, globalization, and privatization

(Stone, 2005) but still hospitality industry has its own problems. Major problems of workers

in hospitality industry can be summarized as below:

Instable employment and high turnover (Average job tenure is 1.5 years in USA, 18

months in Europe),

Working hours are too long (More than the time allowed by law), unsocial, irregular,

Low pay, absence of overtime payments,

Low promotion opportunities,

Low professional management of employees,

Gender discrimination (High in women employment-50% but they are less paid than man-

20%),

Child labor and sexual exploitation of children in the industry.

Although there are many problems in the industry and workers can fight for their rights,

unionization level is very low (globally at about 10%). Reasons for involvement in unions are

explained by these points:

Fragmented and heterogeneous nature of the industry,

The domination of the industry by small and medium sized organizations,

Reluctance of the employees,

Subcontracting and internships which divide workers up into different segments,

The paternalistic management style,

Part time work, seasonality, labor turnover.

What can be inferred from these data is that there is a vicious cycle because what are the

problems and violations of labor rights are the reasons for low unionization, too while the

reverse should be expected.

Labor Rights in Tourism in Turkey

Even though the number of female workers has increased considerably, the Turkish work-force is still male-dominated in promotional level in tourism industry but when we consider

the general ratio between male and female workers, it is 50 percent.


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From a letter of a worker in a hotel claims that the employees get low wages, there is no

payment for any overtime work, the workers are supposed to work in unhealthy working

conditions at least 10-11 hours in a day and there are certain obstructions for unionizing by

the hotels ad governments.

In Turkey, hotels mostly located in the cities such as Antalya, Bodrum and Marmaris have

common issues in terms of seasonality. The workers at the end of the season could not get

their payments and any compensation that are seen unfortunately as usual problems in

hospitality industry.

With the exception of the police and the armed forces, Turkish workers have the right to

unionize or join existing labor unions. There are three major unions in Turkey. One of them is

OLEYIS (Turkey Hotels, Restaurant and Entertainment Places Workers Union), an active

union in criticizing and fighting for the rights of the labor. It provides unionization to the

Hilton Hotels, Dedeman Hotels and some restaurants and teachers lodges. The second one is

TOLEYIS (Turkeys Hotels, Restaurant and Entertainment Trades Workers Union) is more

conservative and provides unionization to the airline companies and some well- known hotels

such as Cragan Palace Kempinski and Swiss Hotel. The last one is HAVA- IS working with

TURK-IS. It is the voice of civil aviation workers. It is a democra tic and campaigning

union which fights back for aviation workers in the workplace.

According to ILO, for child labor the age limit is 15 with finishing compulsory education.

Least 13-year-old children can work in the soft works such as working in the restaurants as

waiters less than 14 hours in a week. A survey from ILO about the child labor force in Turkey

on October, 1999 illustrates that 78.8 % of 6-17 year-old children continues their education.

The rest has to work to help their family.

In Turkey the 10-12 percent of the workers in service sector or 3-4 percent of total labor force

is employed by tourism industry. The education level of these employees are getting higher

year by year; the percentage was 10 in 1980s and it increased to 30 % in 1990s (Tatldil,

1988). The productivity level of the workers depends on the opportunities (health insurance,

retirement insurance, annual leave and etc.) that their companies provide to them. A big

majority of tourism employees leaves their jobs and wants to work in the other sectors

because they are fired without any reason and there is not social rights given to the workers in

tourism industry (Oral ve Demir, ubat 2001).

In conclusion, there are a lot of labor exploitations around the world. Unfortunately, although

some of them aware of labor rights, many of the workers do not really know what kind ofrights they have. There is a long way to achieve ideal conditions at workplaces and spread

labor rights practices.


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Word Count: 2154

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Patricia H. Werhane, Tara J. Radin & Norman E. Bowie (2004) Employment and EmployeeRights. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
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TRM 431.01 INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS WRITTEN REPORT " LABOR RIGHTS"