A U.S.-Style Union Fight on the Border

Each morning as the sun rises, thousands of workers stream out of Tijuana’s dusty barrios, up the hillsides and into the industrial parks on the mesas above.

But on June 2, that human wave stopped at the gate of Han Young de Mexico as the plant’s 120 workers went on strike.

They demanded negotiations--first with their bosses and then with the authorities of the National Conciliation and Arbitration Board (the JNCA, equivalent to the U.S. National Labor Relations Board). By the end of the second day of the walkout, the company had agreed to bargain, a first in the maquiladora industry, where managers have almost absolute power.

Since then, Han Young managers have moved to regain control, most dramatically by firing Emeterio Armenta, the strike’s leader, in early August. The managers were not acting on their own, but as part of a government-industry network that sets the rules for labor relations in Tijuana. After the strike, the JNCA insisted that the company hire Luis Manuel Escobedo Jimenez as personnel director--it was Escobedo who fired Armenta and two other strike leaders.

Escobedo is a labor consultant--local activists call him a “psychological warfare expert.” Mexican employers haven’t used such people in the past, but maquiladora managers seem to be adopting the hardball U.S. model of labor relations.

Han Young de Mexico is a “feeder” factory. Its workers build truck trailer chassis and metal shipping containers for the huge Hyundai manufacturing complex. The June walkout was fueled by low wages--$36-$48 a week--and some of the most dangerous conditions in a city known for workplace accidents. Han Young workers complain that they often lack welding masks, gloves and safety shoes. The plant has no ventilation system and lead fumes from soldering cause permanent eye damage.

But the Han Young workers’ core demand was company recognition of their independent union. Han Young has had a union since the factory was built years ago--a union that holds no meetings, rarely if ever sends representatives to visit the plant and does not help workers with complaints. Workers call it a company union.

If Han Young workers won recognition of their union, “the formation of independent unions could sweep like a wave through the factories of Tijuana, where conditions are the same,” says Enrique Hernandez, president of the Civic Alliance, a community organization that gives workers legal advice.

Workers sought help from Mexico’s Frente Autentico de Trabajo (Authentic Labor Front). The FAT, Mexico’s most independent labor federation, has been cooperating with the U.S.-based Teamsters Union and United Electrical Workers on organizing drives. A victory by Han Young workers would give FAT a base in Tijuana, a situation that would particularly threaten Hyundai--possibly the city’s most important industrial corporation.

Workers employed in Hyundai’s main plant complain of being hit by Korean foremen. They also report that safety sensors are often disabled and complain of numerous mutilating workplace accidents. These allegations seem to be supported by high turnover rates. In seven years, more than 7,600 workers have passed through a plant that only employs 1,500, says Jaime Cota of Tijuana’s Workers’ Information Center.

Aid from U.S. activists is pushing a new tactic in labor’s arsenal: cross-border organizing. San Diego’s Support Committee for Maquiladora Workers mobilized Southern California unions to send money, fire off telegrams and bring down observers during the strike.

“We try to even the odds faced by maquiladora workers who get into fights with factory owners and the government,” says Mary Tong of the San Diego committee, “and educate people in the U.S. at the same time. In a global economy, the jobs and livelihood of people north of the border can depend on the outcome of the struggles of workers south of it, at factories like Han Young.”