An international labour network

tie (Transnationals Information Exchange) is an international grassroots network of workers and union activists. The network’s focus is on workers from large transnational corporations and their suppliers. It includes both union and non-union workers in the industrial, retail, and service sectors. tie aims to encourage, organize, and facilitate international consciousness and cooperation among workers and their organizations in various parts of the world.

tie was founded in 1978 in Amsterdam through the initiative of union activists from various countries. Today, tie has offices in Brazil, Chilli, the USA, Netherlands, Germany, Russia, Senegal and Asia. From the beginning tie has supported shop floor initiatives that see themselves as part of a broader movement for social change committed to fight for a life without exploitation and exclusion – a life grounded in the dignity of human beings and their freedom for self determination.

Supporting self-organisation and international solidarity

tie supports an international exchange of information and experiences among labour activists, women’s and human rights groups. tie’s activities are geared to enable workers to engage in a process of self-organization, to develop their own strategies for better working and living conditions, and to facilitate international solidarity.

We see solidarity and self-organization as important instruments for fighting back, we understand they also allow workers to experience the empowerment of their own world in the here-and-now and thus the world we want to build. For us solidarity and self-organization mean mutual help between equal partners, brothers and sisters explicitly aiming to overcome existing divisions such as racism and sexism.

A laboratory for new labour strategies

tie is a politically independent non-profit organization that is rooted both in the global South and North. This enables us to build and mobilize ongoing links of common struggle between social movements in different countries. tie has a proven track record of facilitating both the exchange and implementation of fight-back strategies learned through international exchange projects and programs by movement activists.

Exchange of information and experiences

tie organizes local, regional, and international conferences, exchange visits, and education seminars on a regular basis in order to:

• help participants gain a deeper understanding of the process of globalization and the restructuring of work and production
• support an exchange of experiences on labour’s response towards these changes.

Additionally, tie produces informational material, research, documentation, and other publications.

Building international workers networks

tie actively supports and participates in building transnational networks among workers in specific sectors, and among workers employed by the same transnational corporations or their suppliers in different countries. For example, for over 15 years tie has facilitated international exchanges of information and experiences, and common training and education among workers of Daimler-Chrysler (formerly Daimler Benz) in order to:

• work out common union positions and strategies on issues such as new production methods (including work reorganization), health and safety, and racism and sexism
• enable concrete actions of international solidarity between workers
• organize common resistance to company strategies of whipsawing workers in different countries against each other

New challenges, new workplace strategies

Neo-liberal policies, changes in mass production, internationalization of work, as well as the variety of social, political, and economic mechanisms used to divide, exploit, and exclude workers demand continuous evaluation and development of strategies linking local, regional, and international unions, and workers in non-union facilities of the same sector. It is critical that workers, both employed and unemployed, documented and non documented develop these strategies in the context of defending their own interests and responding more effectively to new challenges. For example, tie is facilitating an international health project that joins worker health and safety advocates, trainers, and educators in Brazil, North America, and Europe to deal with the growing epidemic of Repetitive Strain Injuries, Muscle-skeletal, and stress related disorders at work that are due to new work organization and work restructuring. In Brazil tie organizes this international project called Vida Viva to develop informational material, instruments of participative research, education programs, and support national campaigns.

Building democratic workers’ organisation

For workers worldwide globalization has meant not only decreased wages, deteriorating working and living conditions, but also a decrease in democratic rights. As the power of transnational corporations has increased, companies, especially in the global south, have regularly disregarded social, labor, or collective agreements and regulations. Furthermore, the risk of arrest, torture, and even death for union activists or organizers around the world has increased enormously in the last years. tie supports both the building of democratic workers organizations that genuinely represent the interests of workers, as well as new forms of organizing. For example, in Sri Lanka tie together with other organizations has participated in the formation of the Free Trade Zones Workers Union, the first democratic and independent union for workers of the free trade zones of that country.

Fight against racism and sexism

tie is firmly committed to dealing with issues of racism and sexism, and all other forms and mechanisms of exclusion – like the exclusion and oppression of ethnic minorities and workers at the margins. A central component of any tie project is the fight for the development of women's leadership, for self-organization, and self-determination.