Labour rights in Vietnam: group formation and challenges
Within the last six months, Human Rights Watch (HRW) released multiple reports about Vietnam’s refusal to uphold workers’ rights and other governments’ reluctance to hold Vietnam accountable. HRW’s Asia Director, Elaine Person, noted that western governments have been keen to build economic partnerships with Vietnam due to its rapid growth and potential as an alternative to China. HRW’s Asia Advocacy Director, John Sifton, emphasised the Vietnamese government’s intolerance towards independent unions and EU officials’ inefficacy at enforcing Vietnam’s pledges to human rights, including labour reforms.
As change on the international stage stalls, Vietnamese workers are devising grassroots organising tactics to advocate for basic rights such as the end of year bonus (lương tháng 13). Vietnam Rise’s report, Case study: workable practices in initiating and sustaining a labour rights movement in Vietnam, explores the components of such a grassroots-led movement.
How the movement works
Members of a core group (nhóm chủ chốt) seek to educate other workers about their rights and spawn 12-15 workers’ support groups (nhóm tương trợ) across other companies. These support groups each consist of 10-20 individuals whose main activities include contributing to a mutual aid fund for members in case of emergencies and personal crises.
We interviewed four individuals in the core group: Hùng, Bùi, Khánh, and Đan who were all males 30-40 years of age with experience in many types of work including manufacturing, textiles and mining. They describe the gradualness of the recruitment process, beginning with rapport-building over common hobbies which can create avenues for awareness and collective advocacy for their rights. The typical life cycle of support group formation in a company is as follows:
A core group member finds employment at a factory in order to identify 3-4 workers with good standing who can start a support group.
The support group leaders recruit new members over the course of 1-2 years to build trust and avoid catching authorities’ attention.
As members build, the group selects a treasurer and focuses on building moral and financial support.
After two years during which the group has been well-established, the group elects a core representative to build relationships with workers in other companies. The initial core group member should also withdraw to protect himself/herself and the group.
The support group should disband once they succeed in reaching agreed upon concrete goals.
Challenges that the movement faces
Significant challenges relating to security and worker motivation complicate the process of forming support groups. First, the government’s methods for suppressing dissent via state-controlled organisations are cohesive and maintain tight control over movement leaders. These state organisations include The Vietnam General Confederation of Labour (Liên Đoàn Lao Động) and the government's labour management division (Quản lý Khu Công nghiệp). While these organisations nominally represent workers, in practice they function as tools of state surveillance that threaten movement leaders and participants with fear of detainment and loss of work. Legal protections available to workers under such threats are unclear. As an example from 2017, a group of workers from different ethnic minorities initiated a four-day strike in Thanh Hóa after their team leader made a racially insulting remark. Group members were fired and blacklisted from finding employment at other firms. The need to remain discreet slows down activities as they cannot meet often and sometimes temporarily halt activities and communications with one another if authorities suspect they are organising.
Second, core group members reported difficulties in persuading workers to undertake potential personal risk to contribute to a movement for collective labour rights. Many workers are indifferent to the notion of rights (and the possibility of promoting them) until they themselves have been affected. Labour contracts and related legal documents are often obscure and vague. Furthermore, witnessing harsh punishments against movement leaders creates a chilling effect that discourages others from following suit.
However, workers’ motivation and potential to organise vary according to age, company type, location and path into the labouring profession. In the next post, we explore the group’s experiences working with different demographics of workers, their readiness for mobilisation and the best point in a company’s life cycle to form a support group. For a better understanding of this labour movement and the challenges they face, please see more details in the report Case study: workable practices in initiating and sustaining a labour rights movement in Vietnam.