International: internal ILO debate over the exact nature of the right to strike

February 18, 2015 has been designated by the ITUC and unions in several countries around the globe as a global day of action in defence of the ‘right to strike’. For the past two years, in the private corridors at the ILO, employers’ bodies and trade unions have been fiercely opposed over the issue of determining if the ILO standards guarantee the fundamental right to strike or not. This dispute impacts the ILO’s supervision and monitoring of its standards (since the functioning of the commission applying the standards is hindered). However it is above all of critical importance for the unions who remind us that collective action is an essential instrument for the exercise of the right to collective negotiation.