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Paraguay Urban Labor
Labor has not been an organized, tightly knit, autonomous force
in Paraguay. The firms have traditionally been small, workers were
not politically active, and personal relationships between
employers and employees prevailed. As in other
Southern Cone (see Glossary)
countries, the paternal state anticipated demands of a
growing labor force, granted some benefits, and impeded the
formation of strong labor organizations. When Stroessner came to
power, most of organized labor belonged to the Paraguayan
Confederation of Workers (Confederación Paraguaya de Trabajadores--
CPT), an unstructured amalgam of trade unions. Despite its loose
association with the Colorado Party, the CPT declared a general
strike in 1958. Stroessner crushed the strike, dismissed the CPT
leadership, and appointed a police officer as its head. Consistent
with these actions, the government, and not the workers, continued
to determine the confederation's leadership in the late 1980s.
The CPT remained the only legally recognized large labor
organization; it contained 60,000 member, and claimed to represent
90 percent of organized labor. The CPT's refusal to endorse strikes
after 1959 reflected the government's dominance over it. In 1985
the CPT lost its membership in the International Labour
Organisation (ILO) after an ILO delegation to Paraguay determined
that the CPT was neither independent nor democratic. Nonetheless,
the CPT's existence allowed the labor force some access to
government officials.
The first attempt to reform the labor movement came in 1979 with
the emergence of the Group of Nine trade unions. The group, which
included bank workers, a sector of construction workers, and the
outlawed journalists' union, unsuccessfully attempted to take
control of the CPT in March 1981. Several unions of the group
subsequently broke away from the CPT and in 1982 led a successful
national boycott of Coca Cola in order to reinstate trade union
members at the bottling plant. From this effort emerged the InterUnion Workers Movement (Movimiento Intersindical de Trabajadores--
MIT) in 1985. The MIT received recognition from both the
International Confederation of Free Trade Unions and the Latin
American Central Organization of Workers (Central Latinoamericana
de Trabajadores--Clat), both of which sent representatives to
express their support for the new movement. In the late 1980s, the
MIT remained small, and its members were subject to harassment and
imprisonment; nevertheless, it was still the only independent labor
movement since Stroessner took power.
Data as of December 1988
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