February 18, 2015 has been designated by the ITUC and unions in several countries around the globe as a global day of action in defence of the ‘right to strike’. For the past two years, in the private corridors at the ILO, employers’ bodies and trade unions have been fiercely opposed over the issue of determining if the ILO standards guarantee the fundamental right to strike or not. This dispute impacts the ILO’s supervision and monitoring of its standards (since the functioning of the commission applying the standards is hindered). However it is above all of critical importance for the unions who remind us that collective action is an essential instrument for the exercise of the right to collective negotiation.
Since 2012, the workers’ and employers’ bodies within the ILO have been at loggerheads over this issue that is culminating in the February mobilization action. Over the past years the expert committee tasked with preparing a report on Member States’ respect for ILO* standards has developed a doctrine on the right to strike – which is not in itself enshrined in an international labor standard, even if it features in most CSR standards and is treated as a fundamental right that stems from the right to freedom of association.
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