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Challenging ‘umthetho we femu’ (the law of the firm): gender relations and shop-floor battles for union recognition in Natal's textile industry, 1973–85

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Alex Lichtenstein
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Abstract

As part of a growing working-class movement that sought full legal status as employees in South Africa, stable urban residence and union recognition, female African factory workers became part of a dynamic new labour movement emanating from the shop floor. At the same time, this new role allowed them to challenge patriarchal structures of authority in the factory, the community and the home. This article examines the gender dimension of a bitter inter-union rivalry that beset Durban's Frame textile complex during the early 1980s. With African unions at last recognized by the apartheid state, Frame sought to bolster the strength of a compliant company union in order to thwart the organizing drive of a more confrontational independent union, an affiliate of the newly established Federation of South African Trade Unions (FOSATU). This union rivalry was fought out in the courts as well as inside the factory, in the streets of Durban's townships, and in an African workers’ hostel in nearby Clermont. The legal dispute generated affidavits by women workers attesting to the pressures they faced to join the company union and their reasons for preferring FOSATU. This evidence shows that African women successfully challenged the patriarchal authority of male managers, security personnel, indunas and male co-workers at Frame in order to join an independent union.

Résumé

Dans le cadre d'un mouvement ouvrier grandissant en quête de plein statut juridique en tant qu'employés en Afrique du Sud, de résidence urbaine stable et de reconnaissance syndicale, des ouvrières d'usine africaines ont rejoint un nouveau mouvement ouvrier dynamique émanant de la base. Dans le même temps, ce nouveau rôle leur a permis de remettre en cause les structures patriarcales de l'autorité au sein de l'usine, de la communauté et du foyer. Cet article examine la dimension de genre d'une rivalité intersyndicale acharnée dont a fait l'objet le complexe textile Frame de Durban au début des années 1980. Les syndicats africains étant enfin reconnus par l’État d'apartheid, Frame cherchait à renforcer un syndicat d'entreprise conciliant afin de contrecarrer les efforts de syndicalisation d'un syndicat indépendant plus conflictuel affilié à la Federation of South African Trade Unions (FOSATU) nouvellement créée. Cette rivalité syndicale s'est débattue devant les tribunaux, mais également dans l'enceinte de l'usine, dans les rues des townships de Durban et dans un foyer de travailleurs africains de Clermont, une proche township. Le différend juridique a donné lieu à des déclarations sous serment des ouvrières attestant des pressions dont elles faisaient l'objet pour adhérer au syndicat d'entreprise, et de leur raisons pour préférer la FOSATU. Ces données probantes montrent que les femmes africaines ont réussi à défier l'autorité patriarcale des cadres, du personnel de sécurité, des indunas et des co-ouvriers de Frame pour adhérer à un syndicat indépendant.

Type
Work across Africa
Information
Africa , Volume 87 , Issue 1 , February 2017 , pp. 100 - 119
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2017 

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