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Argentina

The trade union movement has been a major political and economic actor throughout Argentine history, from the initial stages of a consolidation of a working class. The history and memory of trade-union organization, mobilization and struggle is a heated topic of discussion when analyzing the present and the future of the country. 

Particularly, considering that Argentina has a historical tradition that combines strong industrial-type and nationally-based trade-union organizations with exclusive bargaining rights for a single organization in each economic activity, strong national trade-union confederations and a firm presence at the shop-floor by means of delegates elected by the rank and file and “comisiones internas”, a body of shop-floor representatives. From some perspectives, this is considered a central asset and a crucial tradition that favored the consolidation of a structure of rights, while others consider this as one of the main problems of Argentina.

While debates and confrontations regarding the place of workers and trade-unions in society were present in different stages, one period was particularly dramatic: the brutal dictatorship between 1976-1983 in Argentina, which left a serious legacy of human rights violations as well as a significant loss of economic, social and political rights. The working class and the trade union movement, always encompassing different sectors with various ideologies and perspectives, became targets and underwent strong transformations, many of which were deepened during ensuing neoliberal governments. Today, many Argentinian trade union organizations are engaged in issues related to history and memory, not only concerning the long-term history of these organizations and their workers, but also in terms of the victims of these human rights violations that marked their organizations during the dictatorship, increasingly becoming part of the process of Memory, Truth and Justice to remember these crimes and repair their long-lasting impacts along with continuing fighting for economic and labour rights.