INTER-UNION CONFLICT IN THREE INDONESIAN FACTORIES

From the perspectives of the pluralist and radical schools of industrial relations, workers in any given company are collectively positioned against management because of the fundamentally different interests of labour and capital. Yet in Indonesia, as in many other countries, the reality now is that more than one union can operate in a single workplace. The question arises, then, what conflict between unions at the company level means if the primary purpose of forming a union is to work to further members ’ interests and protect them from unjust treatment by management. What happens when unions when they use shop-floor level resources to compete against other unions instead of using those resources in their struggles to advance members ’ interests? This relatively little-studied issue is of vital importance in contemporary Indonesia, as unions struggle to come to terms not only with expanded opportunities to organise, but with inter-union competition not only at the national and regional levels, but in the workplace. After the fall of Suharto, Indonesia experienced a rapid expansion of democratic space, which in the industrial relations arena vastly increased workers ’ freedom t