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After a large group of Iranian revolutionaries were killed on September 8, 1978 (known as “Black Friday,”) oil industry workers went on strike, ultimately accelerating Iran’s 1979 Revolution. Laborers in other industries and factories – such as concrete and shoe factories, the automotive industry, metal works, and steel mills – joined the strike. These widespread strikes paralyzed Iran’s economy. According to some experts, overthrowing the Shah’s regime would not have been possible without the widespread participation and cooperation of laborers. This victory gave laborers the self-confidence to join forces with others, become stakeholders in the events after the Revolution, and defend their legitimate interests. Through the formation of Laborers’ Councils, Iranian laborers in the industrial sector organized with the goal of aiding the Revolution. Through their experiences during the Revolution, they learned firsthand the effectiveness of forming councils and other similar organizations.
Twenty eight years after the Revolution, it is reported that there are more than nine million wage-earning laborers and 4.5 million unemployed persons in Iran. Due to mismanagement in the economic, labor, and political spheres, laborers who have not yet lost their jobs live in constant fear of becoming unemployed. This insecurity has led them to realize that they cannot improve their situation by continuing to interact with institutions that are dependent on the current regime. Therefore, discussions to create independent labor organizations and trade union activities have taken place for some time now. Iranian laborers prefer to discuss their demands peacefully and avoid violence. However, the regime’s information and security apparatus does not tolerate protests (peaceful or otherwise) and persistently represses them. This inhibition of peaceful gatherings, the regime’s failure to address the laborers’ legitimate concerns, and the extreme dissatisfaction of Iranian laborers could lead to the next political crisis which the regime will not be able to resolve through suppression.
Aware that labor organizations are dependent on the regime, the Islamic Republic effectively treats laborers as objects rather than individuals. Iranian laborers are at a breaking point. After their victory in the Revolution, the laborers’ revolutionary zeal was misused by the newly established regime. The regime used laborers in its goal to eliminate prominent managers in production and service centers. Islamic councils and associations, which had been established in various production centers, were placed at the service of the new regime’s extremists. The extremists eliminated experienced and skilled managers, supervisors, and laborers by publishing communiqués and by accusing them of cooperating with the previous regime, opposing the Revolution, and not complying with Islamic standards.
Laborers who had helped form Islamic associations and transform them into decision-making organizations continued to eliminate experienced, successful managers and specialists. The laborers were filled with revolutionary fervor and believed they were laying the groundwork for a political atmosphere responsive to their needs. Now, more than 28 years after the Revolution, their situation has deteriorated to the point where regime-sponsored labor organizations are facing major challenges, some even losing government support. Laborers are challenging non-independent, regime-sponsored labor organizations and are increasingly relying on independent organizations to represent them in their fight for more rights.
For years, the dissatisfaction of Iranian laborers was hidden from international labor rights organizations. Labor protests were silenced inside the country and news about them rarely found its way abroad. But recently, these organizations have been charting the violation of the fundamental rights of Iranian workers. International Labor Organization (ILO) – of which Iran is a member – and other international human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, report regularly on issues facing Iranian laborers and their deteriorating situation. These organizations want Iran to stop arresting, torturing, incarcerating, and threatening to execute leaders of the labor movement, who face accusations of communicating with foreigners. They want Iran to officially recognize the fundamental rights of laborers, including peaceful assembly and establishment of independent organizations and trade unions. Thus far, the Iranian government has ignored the protests of international organizations and has continued suppressing laborers. The labor movement may become so discouraged that it will halt peaceful protests and use other methods, creating a difficult challenge for the government.
Given the intolerance and complexity of the regime’s information and security apparatus, Iranian laborers lack the legal means to protest their current situation, which is characterized by low wages, poor job security, delayed payment of salaries, lack of unemployment insurance, and inadequate social security benefits. In this environment of continued suppression, the Iranian government strives to survive politically, without fear of unrest or accountability. While some Iranians fear unrest, the current deplorable economic situation – which negatively impacts laborers – is fundamentally unjust and unsustainable.
Iran’s International Obligations
International organizations dealing with labor rights and international conventions and agreements consider trade union activities among workers’ fundamental rights. Iran is a member of the United Nations (UN) and, as such, its government cannot ignore or violate the fundamental rights of workers, which have gained legitimacy through principles of international law.
Article 22 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and Article 8 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) emphasize the right of workers to form and join unions. Iran is a signatory to these important covenants, which were appended to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. Iran is also a member of ILO (1) and is obligated to carry out its provisions. Owing to its ILO membership, the Iranian government may halt protests only in special emergency situations and for short periods. However, this has not been the case in all the instances where the Iranian government has stopped, banned, or suppressed protest gatherings by laborers. The right to form trade unions and the right to collective bargaining are among other fundamental principles articulated by the ILO.
Obligations undertaken by governments when they sign international treaties have the force of law. Article 9 of Iran’s Civil Code has recognized the legal character of these obligations and the necessity to execute them. Therefore, when the Iranian government violates labor laws against international standards, it commits two violations: 1) first, it breaks its commitment to the international community, negatively affecting Iran’s credibility; and 2) it ignores the Civil Code of Iran.
Governments of countries that are members of ILO are obligated to sign the appended supplemental covenants. So far, the Iranian government has signed 12 supplemental covenants while refusing to sign five others. Two are particularly important to workers. Covenant 67 addresses the right to form trade unions and Covenant 98 addresses collective bargaining contracts. Iran’s refusal to sign these two supplemental covenants should not give the country license to ignore the rights of Iran’s workers. By becoming a member, Iran has accepted ILO’s fundamental principles and standards. The ILO condemns the Iranian government’s actions against the fundamental rights of workers and has requested that it respect international laws.
Iran’s actions with regard to labor rights were examined at an ILO conference in June 2006 in Brussels. In its preliminary conclusions, the Committee on Laborers’ Freedom of Association condemned the Iranian government’s arrests of several trade union members. This committee determined that the Iranian police’s violent attack on the International Labor Day march held on May 1, 2004, violated laborers’ fundamental rights. The committee asked the Iranian government to form an independent study group to investigate the violations committed by the Ministry of Information and Security and other institutions and to keep the committee informed of its findings.
Currently, in Iran protesting laborers are threatened with temporary arrest, long-term imprisonment, termination from work, and other heavy punishments. The latest news indicates that protesting laborers are being accused of the serious and dangerous charges of committing “actions against national security” and “planning a Velvet Revolution, in concert with the United States.”
A Review of the Deficiencies of the Law
As workers in Iran face inadequate protection under the current law, they seek ways to voice their legitimate demands so as not to encounter a variety of violent reactions from the government.
The current labor law, ratified in 1989, is inefficient and, unlike pre-Revolution labor laws, lacks protection for workers. Pre-revolution labor laws, ratified in 1948 and 1949, recognized the right to form trade unions. Labor law expert Mohammad Hassan Aghayie identifies Article 130 in current law as officially recognizing ideological institutions or Islamic associations within factories and the workplace...” (2) He also cites Article 194 as evidence of new institutions created after the Revolution, including a “laborer mobilization” organization which is created with the cooperation of the basij (volunteer militia) of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards.” (3)
Another labor specialist, Hossein Akbari, describes how after the Revolution elements of the new regime essentially destroyed laborers’ rights to engage in trade union activity: “[T]he Revolutionary Council ratified a bill on Islamic labor councils. The objective of this bill was to create confusion about trade unions, labor rights, and the overlapping of responsibilities of trade unions and the Islamic labor councils.”
This same bill, passed July 22, 1980, made the formation of trade unions in large production units – such as in the petroleum, steel, and copper industries – unlawful. The by-laws of the Islamic Council of Laborers, which were ratified on August 31, 1980 by the Supreme Council on Labor, were compiled on the basis of the above bill. In these by-laws, further restrictions were placed on trade union institutions, and the boundary between labor organizations or trade unions and the Islamic councils became blurred. According to Article 256 of these by-laws, “Trade union or labor organizations will no longer be officially recognized and accepted in production units where Islamic councils exist.” The note to Article 27 of these by-laws provides even more limitations: “Persons who represented laborers or who served on executive committees of a trade union before the Revolution may not become members of the council for a period of two years from the ratification of these by-laws.” (4)
On this basis, the Vahed Bus Drivers’ Union – which was legally recognized before the Revolution – was pronounced illegal after the Revolution and later revived in 2004. On December 22, 2005, 12 Vahed leaders were arrested. All were freed later, except for Mansour Osanloo, President of the Vahed Board of Directors, who has spent months in prison. On December 25, 2005, many Vahed members were arrested while preparing to protest the imprisonment of their colleagues. In 2006, Iranian laborers shifted their strategy. Recognizing that the Iranian government did not support them in their efforts to increase their rights, they began to articulate their demands to international organizations concerned with labor and human rights. As a result, in 2006, in addition to ILO, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and others turned their attentions to the dire situation of Iranian laborers, demanding that the Iranian government observe international labor laws and human rights standards. Despite the government’s disregard of these warnings, the Vahed Bus Drivers’ Union, which was established in 1968 but had been inactive since 1979, became active again in 2005. Some sources believe that the revival of the Vahed Bus Drivers’ Union is a sign that the labor movement is finding its place in Iran. This is partly due to communication between Iranian laborers and international organizations.
Certain authorities within the Islamic labor councils use the labor law, which was ratified in 1989, to justify police action against members of the Vahed Bus Company Drivers’ Union. The ambiguity of this law not only establishes government-sponsored Islamic labor councils but also sanction these organizations, thereby acting, in effect, as arms of the government to suppress independent labor organizations. Mr. Mahjoub, a recent member of Parliament and current Secretary General of the Workers’ House, had this to say in defense of the government’s violent encounters with Vahed’s peaceful gatherings: “Legally speaking, within this setting there cannot be two organizations. For this reason, the Vahed Bus Company Drivers’ Union has been confronted by the Bus Drivers’ Islamic Councils.”
The Labor Law’s Deficiencies Regarding Temporary Workers
The proliferation of temporary labor contracts could be the most serious problem facing Iranian workers. Temporary workers have even fewer rights than full-time workers and have no job security. Not only have Iran’s weak labor laws and their interpretations worsened the situation of temporary laborers, but they have also increased the number of permanent workers who become temporary workers.
The current labor law has been ratified to support an economy run by an authoritarian government, which also happens to be the country’s largest employer. This law was formulated in such a way that, with the objective of supporting laborers, it has created certain obligations and restrictions for large government factories and foundations. This law is not compatible with privatization. Therefore, with the slower privatization process and the reduction of government-run economic enterprises (which took place in the second decade after the Revolution,) it became increasingly difficult for laborers to enjoy even the few protections afforded them by law. The single most important action against labor interests was in 1994, during the presidency of Mr. Hashemi Rafsanjani. In that year, the Ministry of Labor interpreted Note 2 of Article 7 of the Labor Law to mean that employers could cancel labor contracts, including for non-seasonal work, thereby transforming the classification of the work force from permanent to temporary. Today, more than half of the work force in production units (to which labor laws apply) are considered temporary laborers.
The labor law no longer applies to businesses employing fewer than ten people, or to carpet weavers. This is a result of the current government’s policies, including its interpretation of what it means to privatize public industries. Therefore, under the existing circumstances, and given the Supreme Leader’s emphasis on widespread privatization, the labor law is not effective, even in cases where it could have benefited laborers.
In 1990, Iran’s economic situation was not strong enough to carry out the provisions of the labor law ratified in the same year. However, Marxist revolutionary forces appealed to workers in the pre- and post-Revolution periods. Political elements in the post-revolutionary regime sought to reduce the power and reach of Marxist appeal in order to boost the Islamic appeal. Perhaps, the lack of relevance of the1990 labor law to Iran’s economic situation was a result of the battle between Marxist and Islamic forces for the Iranian labor constituency. Thus, despite the ratification of a relatively progressive law, in practice, none of the laborers’ important problems have been solved. The worsening economic situation, the obstacles for entrepreneurs or independent employers, and the government’s domination over management and economic corruption have led to the collapse of many businesses. In a society where contractors, employers, and producers are not connected to certain economic networks and therefore cannot afford to pay wages, laborers’ rights will certainly not be respected – even with the existence of progressive laws.
To improve the rights of workers, the current labor law must be reformed. It is true that this law is incompatible with the country’s economic situation, but Iran is a country rich in resources. Iranians must lay the groundwork for the proper implementation of a labor law, which on the books, provides for basic labor rights. The government must create a secure environment for domestic and foreign investment and work to create jobs where contracts will be respected. Workers will not gain rights in the current atmosphere where economic corruption is rife and there is no security for investors and employers.
Notes
(1) ILO was founded in 1919. After the establishment of the United Nations in 1944 [sic: 1945], ILO was officially recognized as a specialized UN agency dealing with labor matters. Most countries of the world are members of ILO. ILO’s main objectives include: improvement of laborers’ situations and work conditions; and creation of employment opportunities and job security.
(2) Mohammad Hassan Aghayie, “The Need to Reform the Labor Law,” Norouz 2, no. 371, (July 13, 2002): 9. Aghayie is a professor of labor law and social security and a specialist in employment classification.
(3) Ibid.
(4) Hossein Akbari, Reform the Labor Law.
Works Consulted
Shahram Rafi’zadeh, “The Termination of 320,000 Laborers in One Year,” Rooz (June 19, 2006).
This article first appeared on the May issue of Gozaar Online Magazine.
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