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Interview: Guy Ryder

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Page context: Home > Transport International Magazine > Issue 9 August 2002 > Interview: Guy Ryder

Guy Ryder is the new General Secretary of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU). He succeeds Bill Jordan who had been in the post since 1995.

The ICFTU is an international trade union body which brings together national trade union centres. It currently has 225 affiliated organisations in 148 countries and territories. It is a member of “Global Unions”, along with the Global Union Federations including the ITF, and the Trade Union Advisory Committee (TUAC) to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

Guy was previously at the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in Geneva, which he joined in 1988. In his last post there, he worked as a special adviser to the ILO Director-General, Juan Somavía.

Born in Liverpool, UK, in 1956, Guy obtained an MA degree in Social and Political Sciences at Cambridge University. He then worked as an assistant in the international department of the Trades Union Congress of the UK from 1981 to 1985. From there he moved to the International Federation of Commercial, Clerical, Professional and Technical Employees (FIET), serving as Industry Trade Section Secretary until he joined the ILO.

Guy, you recently left your job at the International Labour Organisation. Could you say something about your experience there, how you see the current position and direction of the ILO, and what you feel that might mean for the union movement?

My experience confirmed my view that the ILO needs to assert itself as a key actor in the governance of globalisation, and to adapt its means of action so that it can be truly effective in carrying out its mandate for social justice and promotion of workers’ rights.
I think it is moving in the right direction. The ILO has gained in profile and coherence in recent years, and is establishing its key role in the international system. Its World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalisation is one example. This has to be good for the international trade union movement because we share goals and values with the ILO. We have an obvious interest in seeing it strengthened and successful.

You have just been elected General Secretary of the ICFTU. What do you feel are the key priorities for the ICFTU at present?

The ICFTU groups national trade union centres organising 157 million workers in all parts of the world. That gives it unparalleled force – and responsibilities. Our task, above all, is to bring that force to bear effectively in favour of workers in the era of globalisation. We are moving the debate forward from “globalisation, yes or no?” to meeting the needs of working people and the demands of social justice.

To do that, we need to construct policies that would have globalisation generate not just wealth for some, but also equity, human security, and respect for workers’ rights. We must then win over the governments and international organisations to our views so as to make sure they are implemented. This is a huge task.

If we are going to succeed, the ICFTU and its partner organisations need to equip themselves to meet the challenges of new and rapidly changing circumstances. The ICFTU’s Millennium Review is doing just that: it is an in-depth examination of our structures and working methods aimed at maximising the impact of our work.

One output – that has already taken shape – is the establishment of the Global Unions group, which brings together the ICFTU, the Global Union Federations (formerly ITSs) and TUAC. We view it as an important way of upgrading our visibility, coherence and effectiveness.

In the end, though, the ICFTU’s strength is a function of our ability to engage the commitment of our national affiliates on international issues. More and more, we need to integrate international and national trade union action so that activists, including those in the ITF affiliates, know about, and identify with what we are doing. I see this as a major communications task and a joint responsibility.

What are your feelings about the failure of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) summit in Doha in November 2001 to take labour standards seriously? Where do we go from here?

The Doha Development Agenda, as the WTO is now dubbing it, has got this eloquent silence at its core. Trade Ministers in Doha were unable to bring themselves even to address in any meaningful way the question of labour standards. And that speaks volumes for the type of globalisation model they have in mind for working people.

The WTO seems to be capable of defining just about every issue as “trade-related” except workers’ rights. This amounts to trying to look after all actors in the global economy, except the people. And, as the mood for change grows, the signs are that people really aren’t prepared to put up with it.

The ICFTU’s own post-Doha analysis has made clear that we will continue to put workers’ fundamental rights at the heart of our work on globalisation. At the same time we need to encompass in a single agenda the wider range of issues which are all critical to development, including the fight against poverty and the safeguarding of basic public services. The work that we do at the WTO, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the ILO and elsewhere needs to be integrated into a single strategy for globalisation. And at the ILO we have a particularly important new opportunity with the establishment of its World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalisation.

The ICFTU was represented both at the World Economic Forum in New York and the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre. Can we be part of both movements? How do you see alliances between unions and the NGO/anti-globalisation movement developing?

We certainly need to be present at both. But that doesn’t mean that we are part of two different or even contradictory movements. Rather, we need to take the same trade union message to the business leaders at Davos and New York and to the social movements and non-governmental organisations at Porto Alegre, have it heard and seek to influence them. That’s why the Global Unions put out a common statement for both events this year, and I think our strengthened presence was effective – the right strategy.

We are part of civil society just as we are part of industry. So just as we need to take our place in the ever-growing civil society movement, we have to take all opportunities to deepen the dialogue with employers, with governments and with international institutions.

Is there any leader in the union movement past or present who has had a major influence on you, and why?

There are so many that it would be difficult and unfair to pick out just a few. One of the great privileges of working in the international movement is that you continually meet people of extraordinary courage and commitment, and have the opportunity to learn from them all the time.

The one name that I would mention would be that of Jack Jones, the legendary leader of the British Transport and General Workers’ Union – a transport workers’ union leader you will have noticed!

He was not only an inspiring national trade union leader but a great internationalist too, and his life has been one of unstinting activism right through to his leadership of the pensioners’ organisation in the UK.

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Issue 9 August 2002

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