Hot eller möjlighet : Svensk fackföreningsrörelse inför globaliseringen

The purpose of this essay is to examine the explanations of globalization and the actions they being taking in answer to it by the three Swedish trade unions Byggnadsarbetarförbundet, IF Metall and Hotell- & Restaurangarbetarförbundet. To answer this three questions have been chosen: what threats and possibilities do the unions see from globalization, what strategy have they chosen against these and how can the choice of strategy be explained. The material used is official publications from the unions. The essay is a qualitative case study and the method is a qualitative text analysis. To answer the two first questions Jeffrey Harrod’s and Robert O’Brien’s Global Unions?- Theory and strategies of organized labour in the global political economy was used. This was complemented by other more specific literature on the trade union movement and globalization. To answer the third question theory on organizational development from Angelo Panebianco’s Political parties: organization and power was used. All of the unions see globalization mostly as a threat; however they all explain this threat in different ways depending on particular events they have recently had to deal with. Their interpretations can also be linked to the interests of the organizations themselves or important interest groups. They also have different strategies of action which can be related to their explanation of globalization. These actions rarely extend that of the particular interest of each of the organizations. This can be explained by them being in what Panebianco calls the third phase of organizational development, the interest based phase. According to him this is a phase of decline for an organization. That all examined unions are in this phase can lead to serious consequences for the Swedish trade union movement. It is also critical that they all have different explanations and actions against globalization since a furthered national cooperation in the trade union movement could potentially strengthen it