Development of Trade Unions and Membership After 1989
After the regime changes of the year 1989 OPZZ remained the strongest trade union federation, but like all other trade unions it recorded a dramatical decrease in membership. While in the middle of the nineties about 4.5 million people were members of OPZZ, this number fell to under 2 million by the year 2001 and it is estimated that in 2007 there were less than 750.000 members. At the beginning of 2002 a new trade union federation split away from OPZZ, namely the FZZ Forum with 515.000 members mainly from civil service, local governments, railways, energy, mines and other state-owned enterprises. In autumn 1981 ten million people belonged to NSZZ Solidarnosc, but after its second legalization in April 1989 it did not manage to regain its previous significance and number of members. While in 2001 there still were about 1.1 million members, in December 2005 there were only 721.8561. At the same time there are drastic differences between state enterprises and civil service, where about 28 per cent of employees belong to trade unions, and the private sector, where only 3 per cent are organised in trade unions2. From 1982 until 2005 the overall degree of unionization fell from 80 per cent to below 14 per cent. This dramatic decline lead to Poland being one of the EU-countries with the lowest degree of unionization. Most of the trade unions’ members (51.7 per cent) are women, especially in the educational sector, health and civil services, but also 35 per cent of members of mining trade unions are female. Only 2.4 per cent of employees under the age of 25 belong to a trade union.
1 Report of the 20th national congress of NSZZ Solidarnosc, 28–20 September 2006, p. 33
2 Public Opinion Research Center CBOS, Polish Public Opinion, 11/2006, p. 4
3 Juliusz Gardawski, Declining trade union density examined, ‘Foundation Institute of Public Affairs’, Warsaw 2002, published in ‘Eiro-Portal’ (European Industrial Relations Observatory on-line).
4 Juliusz Gardawski, Declining trade union density examined, ‘Foundation Institute of Public Affairs’, Warsaw 2002, published in ‘Eiro-Portal’ (European Industrial Relations Observatory on-line).
The reasons for this rapid deterioration are essentially as follows4:
- massive shrinkage of traditional industries and sectors, such as mining and steel,
- in privatised establishments (“brownfield investment”) with over 250 employees trade unions mostly remained, in mid-sized establishments about one third remained. In small establishments there are almost no trade unions,
- new private enterprises (“greenfield investments”): among big enterprises only 5 per cent of Polish establishments and 33 per cent of foreign establishments have trade unions, in mid-sized and small establishments there are practically no trade unions,
- technology-orientated undertakings like those in the IT-branch with their young staff, who often have academic degrees, have almost no unionization,
- due to high unemployment, which in some regions reaches 30 per cent and in the whole country 12 per cent (November 2007), many employees are afraid of founding or joining a trade union.
Read more about this topic: History Of Trade Unions In Poland
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