Abstract
Climate change is a fundamental industrial relations issue. Just transition (JT) is a union strategy for ensuring that workers do not bear the burden of transition to a low carbon economy, moving beyond the ‘jobs versus the environment’ perspective that sometimes divides unions and environmentalists. JT promotes sustainable development as well as protecting workers’ rights to decent work, green jobs and social protection for those who bear the brunt of transition. Additionally, JT includes participation by workers and unions in the development of climate mitigation policy and practices at national, sectoral and workplace levels.
JT policy originated with the US Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers’ Union and United Auto Workers’ Union during the 1970s and 1980s, but its adoption by unions was slow because of ‘jobs blackmail’. However, from 2006 the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) took leadership in promoting JT at the Conferences of the Parties (COPs) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC), and collaborated with the International Labour Organisation in policy development.
This book’s contributions focus on actors at international, national, regional and industry sector levels, and contributors include activists and academics. The editors’ introduction usefully outlines the history of the development of JT and its influence in international forums, as well as its diversity of meanings. Their bibliography is helpfully extensive.
Morena, Krause and Stevis historicise the concept to locate its core meaning in activity by workers and unions in ‘frontline communities’ affected by transition from carbon-intensive sectors. This is critical because of the acceptance of JT by UN agencies and intergovernmental organisations such as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Bank since the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement included JT in the UNFCC. Subsequent incorporation of the concept by governments, employers and academics, developing policies for rather than by workers, has commonly shifted JT’s meaning to simply part of earlier ‘sustainable development’ or ‘corporate social responsibility’ policies.
Subsequent contributions reiterate the importance of worker agency in the concept and its co-option after mainstream acceptance. Anabella Rosemburg details the international politics and the parties involved in promoting JT on the agenda of the COPs, and its final acceptance in the Paris Agreement. This includes an account of the main drivers from national trade union peak bodies, notably the Spanish, UK and Australian ones.
Two contributions focus on employer organisations incorporating the dialogue of JT into ‘business as usual’. Nils Moussu undertakes discourse analysis of the international employer actors. Caleb Goods identifies three approaches by Australian employer bodies: through co-option processes; denial of worker agency or voice; and hardline resistance to policies to reduce emissions, based especially amongst employers in the fossil fuel sector that wields considerable economic and political power in Australia.
The remaining contributions are case studies at sectoral, national or regional levels. Kali Akuno describes an inspirational community cooperative initiative in Jackson, Mississippi. Cooperation Jackson’s Sustainable Communities Initiative aims to build an ‘ecologically regenerative and democratic solidarity economy … within a broader ecosocialist project’. Since 2014 it has organised and empowered under- and unemployed workers, particularly from Black and Latino communities, in a network of green worker-owned cooperatives producing and retailing healthy food and composting waste in a ‘circular economy’. It also participates in political coalitions, such as the Climate Justice Alliance, supporting the Green New Deal.
Five case studies focus on the fossil fuel sector. Martin Mulwally, Fernando Christianisen and Laura Maffei examine the grassroots oppositional movement to development of shale and gas extraction by ‘fracking’ in Rio Negro, Argentina. The final four studies detail reactions to winding down the coal industry in countries where it has been a key contributor to economic development and power generation, but in vastly differing contexts. In South Africa, Sandra van Niekerk shows that the JT issue is entwined with equitable access to energy, which is currently lacking. Alexander Reitzenstein, Sabrina Schultz and Felix Heilmann analyse policy contradictions in Germany, which has been a global leader in low-carbon transition, but notwithstanding decline in coal use, it remains important for energy and for employment in some communities. A national multi-stakeholder consensus approach to policy development has produced an inadequate lowest common denominator programme for complete phasing-out of coal. Hadrian Merins-Kirkwood and Ian Hussey also reveal Canadian contradictions, with a top-down government JT programme lacking worker input, that will not meet Paris commitments. As with South Africa the issues of energy poverty and socio-economic development are important. In Australia, Darryn Snell focuses on a regional transition from coal-fired power generation in the Latrobe valley. Noting the difficulty of policy development in a neoliberal national political environment, he shows that well-organised unions with financial support from a sympathetic state Labor government have enjoyed some success in job assistance and regional economic revitalisation. The negative role of privatisation in energy production transition is a common factor in these contributions.
Given the urgent major changes facing the fossil fuel sector, the skewing of the book’s content to it is understandable. However, workers generally are affected by climate mitigation policy. Some account of other sectors, notably transport, agriculture, manufacturing, building and even office work, could have addressed the broad threats and opportunities of transition.
Pluto Press nevertheless deserves praise for publishing this timely compilation of well-written contributions. The glossary of acronyms is also particularly useful with so many unions, employers’ groups, non-governmental organisations and intergovernmental bodies involved in climate change policy making. On a technical note, two of the figures are difficult to read.
Finally, a more focused thematic introduction and a conclusion would have improved the book’s coherence. Nevertheless, different levels of focus with a common understanding of the dimensions of JT balance the contributions well. One can only hope that the book dates quickly as a result of the implementation of just transition and climate mitigation policy to address our existential crisis.