Las posiciones y las estrategias de las organizaciones sindicales y las organizaciones sociales en España ante la responsabilidad social de las empresas transnacionales

Abstract

In this article we analyse the stances and strategies used by Spanish, European and international trade union organisations, global social organisations and social organisations that comprise global networks in the field of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). We also examine relations involving conflict and collaboration among these actors. On the one hand, trade union organisations condemn the fact that companies are using this field to avoid international regulation of their activities as a strategy that forms part of the neo-liberal economic globalisation project. In this respect, these organisations have been set the objective of counteracting this strategy by promoting the global trade union movement, international trade union action and minimum regulation of the global job market via transnational collective bargaining. On the other hand, global social organisations and organisations that form part of global networks maintain that it is necessary to establish the obligatory nature of compliance on the part of transnational companies with international legislation governing human, labour and environmental rights. Along these lines, these organisations are considering the suitability of setting up an international regulatory, supervisory and sanctioning body at the heart of the UN which would be able to monitor compliance with these rights on a global level. Furthermore, it is of the utmost importance to highlight the fact that relations between trade union organisations and social organisations are, generally speaking, non-existent or even conflictive, taking into account the fact that the former undermine the latter as valid interlocutors in this field and, particularly, in the area of labour, owing to their lack of representation. However, social organisations are playing a major role in the field of CSR and have had a major impact in recent years on social, political and labour —related spheres of activity— which could even point to transformations in the prevailing tripartite set-up existing in labour relations.