Cosatu was born on the eve of one of the most repressive and brutal periods of the apartheid era. Yet it not only survived, but grew in strength during this period. A major reason for this was Cosatu's ability to weave together effective shopfloor unionism with political militancy and a national perspective. What often appeared at the time to be titanic struggles between workerists and populists was synthesised into effective strategic unionism.
The prime task of a union is to represent its members. But more challenging is for a union movement to strategically alter the terrain on which it represents its members. Looking back, Cosatu - building on its forerunners - was capable of such a strategic achievement. The political economy has without doubt been shaped by Cosatu's first ten years of existence.
Background
Much could be said about the background to Cosatu decisions. However, focusing on socio-economic engagement, there are a few important influences.
The first and in many respects the most important was the decision to build national, industrial sector-based unions based on shopfloor organisational structures. This linked unions closely to both the economic performance of the industry and its individual plant or mine components.
These developments occurred in a period of serious job losses in manufacturing and, shortly thereafter, in mining. Unions had to fight both retrenchments and then maximise the retrenchment package - a soul-destroying and very reactive method of bargaining. Stated somewhat simply, a union faced by this situation had a number of options. It could retreat from the shopfloor to avoid endless failure, or it could take refuge in political theory and predict the final collapse of capitalism. A third choice would be to find a more proactive stance.
Another influence was the call for sanctions and disinvestment. For good unionists working in factories where workers could lose their jobs, this was not always an easy position to take. Certainly it opened a lot of space for employers during wage negotiations. To counter this, Cosatu moved to strengthen its arguments on the economic front in support of sanctions and a number of major studies on the economy and industry emerged.
This work was eventually put together into a book edited by Stephen Gelb and the Industrial Strategy Project studies coordinated by Dave Lewis.
Those studies and the later Macro Economic Research Group study for the Alliance coordinated by Vella Pillay resulted in a great deal of comparative work on other economies.
In Cosatu - and before that, in Fosatu - this international exposure was greatly strengthened by a systematic study tour programme. This established very valuable contacts with many other strategic and powerful unions. One of the more interesting exercises that specifically focused on the economy, globalisation, alliances and organisation were trilateral meetings between CUT in Brazil, CGIL in Italy and Cosatu in South Africa.
However, understanding the contemporary workings of international capitalism and considering solutions does not in itself change the terrain.
Two other ingredients were necessary. The first was the power of mass mobilisation used to act against the apartheid state.
Far from being an apparently crude and simple political instrument, the truth is that this is an exceedingly complex phenomenon and it cannot just be switched on and off. The basis for such an action is a powerful popular preparedness to act in the face of danger. Thereafter, very careful leadership decisions have to be made.
The second ingredient arose from the first. Faced by a new and decidedly hostile Labour Relations Bill, Cosatu invoked mass action against the Bill. It forced a concession and the dog had caught the cat so to speak. Did we stand back or did we actually enter negotiations?
The decision was made to negotiate and the settlement not only redrafted the Act but agreement was made to enter discussions on other socio-economic issues. The die was cast toward strategic unionism. We had entered the politics of engagement. We had entered the sophisticated arena of fighting a war of position and a war of manoeuver - this was in 1988.
On reflection, it is interesting to contemplate that the ANC was preparing a very similar process encapsulated in the Harare Declaration and the initiatives of Comrade Mandela and his colleagues.
Strategy and engagement
The need to address actual job losses because of structural changes in industries; plant and mine closures; the need for an economic rationale for sanctions; international exposure to the challenges of globalisation; the power of mass mobilisation and successful negotiations all laid the basis for strategic engagement.
However, this direction immediately raises a profound dilemma for socialists - does engagement by working class formations merely reform and sustain the capitalist system? Is it not better to resist so as to force a collapse of capitalism?
Unfortunately this is an extremely complex debate much beset by dogma. Its theoretical resolution is badly needed and even then unlikely to be a timeless and universal solution. Space (and I regret time) preclude further discussion.
For the purposes of reflecting on Cosatu's role, let us start with issues closer to practice. Faced with rising unemployment, severe structural problems in the economy and significant changes in production processes that are being globalised by capital, Cosatu had to make choices. And it chose to be proactive and enter negotiations around restructuring. To do this, it needed a positive programme of action and a national forum in which to contest this. Cosatu began working on both of these.
On the programme of action, no perfect blue print has ever been produced. Basic positions were adopted and developed over time. On a national forum, Cosatu, along with Nactu and Fedsal, fought for and won a National Economic Forum. After the April election this was translated into Nedlac.
At this stage an important and blunt truth has to be dealt with - the position within which the South African economy and its people find themselves.
South Africa has a medium-size economy, dependent on primary product exports, a protected manufacturing sector with high levels of unemployment, poverty and basic deprivation. In addition, it is surrounded by neighbours whose position is usually even more serious.
There are of course strengths in our economy, but it would be a criminal blindness that did not see the magnitude of the challenge before us. The realities of the matter are that neither of the untested utopias - the free market or a new socialism - offers any substantive policy programme in the here and now.
Stripped of all other essentials, the Tripartite Alliance is built on this reality.
Cosatu needs to try to engage and shape the terrain on which structural change will occur and within which the challenges of globalisation are addressed. The ANC, as the governing party, needs to mobilise a truly national effort to address the needs of our people, and the South African Communist Party, to its credit, joins this effort. For the SACP this does not mean that socialism has been abandoned - in the traditions of Marxism an examination of theory is grounded in the praxis of improving the position of the working class.
The Alliance provides the political base for the macro-economic programme set out in the RDP. And the strength of this Alliance offers a very real and possibly the only feasible option to business for the way forward. Business, in its many different forms, is also threatened and challenged by globalisation and the immiseration of our peoples. And it is not exempt from considering its views on capitalism in the contemporary realities of South Africa.
The RDP is not a wish list but a set of solutions based on a careful analysis of the realities we face. Within this Cosatu will continue to represent its members to their best advantage. Business will continue to try and maximise profit. The ANC will use its unique structures and history to unify a national effort and build a nation. And the SACP will continue to represent the aspirations of workers and the poor, and through a definition of its role and the struggle of class forces, strive for a socialist future.
For Cosatu the key element of their strategy must be to push for active labour market policies to manage structural change, to be part of industrial strategy, to stress employment and the meeting of basic needs, to protect workers' rights and participate in productivity gains in industry and the economy. However, success will still require shopfloor organisation, industrial union strength, militancy and a strategic policy capacity.
Differing interests and class forces will continue to play themselves out, but on a terrain designed to address and then avert a pending socio-economic crisis.
None of us - the Alliance, business and communities - can enjoy the luxury of political jousting. Our minds must focus on the fact that our success needs every ounce of our energy. Only parties that could not mobilise on the RDP can afford to joust for a mere political advantage. Our liberation struggle still has much work to do.
Alec Erwin, former Numsa national education officer, now an MP and Deputy Minister of Finance