We don't often think about it anymore, but the trade unions have been fighting for the working people for a century and a half. Matters such as pensions, holidays or minimum wage are not self-evident, but are rights acquired through actions. This union history has now been given a new site.
Since the creation of trade unions in the mid-nineteenth century, much has improved in the workplace. Strikes and negotiations for better working conditions proved to be a powerful weapon. But also outside the workplace, in people's daily lives, trade unions played a greater role than was long thought. Much information about this is gathering dust, for example in the archive of the International Institute of Social History (IISH).
In order to make the history of the trade union movement and its importance for the Dutch economy more visible, the Dutch Trade Union Federation (FNV) is now launching a new website together with the IISH:trade union stories.nl.
This site features fifty important and moving stories about events that changed the lives of employees forever. But you can also find embarrassing stories. “It has not become a promotional site for the FNV”, according to trade union historian Sjaak van der Velden (IISH) and employee of the site. “We also show the less beautiful sides of the trade union past.”
Impact history
Initially, the FNV wanted an informative site to inspire its own union members. But it turned out that there were so many stories that show how broad the trade union movement was and how much impact it had on Dutch history that the historian argued for a broader approach.
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Van der Velden:“The trade union history is indispensable if you want to understand how the Netherlands works in economic terms, but people often don't realize that anymore. Unions, for example, played a major role in the creation of the minimum wage in the 1960s. Before that, a boss could pay what he wanted, but the unions have been given a livable lower limit in the code. Much has also been achieved in the field of safety. When it turned out that the paint fumes literally drove painters crazy, good ventilation and water-based paint were enforced for them.”
Opposed women and migrants
The newly launched website contains fifty stories, subdivided into the themes of action, culture, organization and consultation. Van der Velden:“The theme of action is of course logical, with the well-known strike stories. But to make it exciting, we also wanted to add more unknown information. For example, many people do not know that the unions organized training for its members to develop and elevate them, as they called it then. They also founded sports clubs in the 1920s and 1930s and organized their own Olympic Games. A bit soft though, taking part under the motto is more important than winning.”
But there are also less uplifting stories to tell about the unions. “The unions have opposed many strikes. For example, the famous February strike during World War II was a communist initiative:many union officials opposed it. The strike at the Optilon zipper factory in 1973 is also not a pretty story. This company employed many women who did the same work as the men. However, the men received a 10 percent pay increase and the women only 5 percent, after which they went on strike. The unions boycotted the women and opposed equal pay policies.”
Migrants have also had a hard time. A hundred years ago, the Chinese, or 'the yellow danger', were still seen as strikebreakers. “In any case, the trade union movement for a long time saw outside labor as downward pressure on wages, so it was opposed to that. We also show how, as a white stronghold, she did not treat migrants too neatly.”
The sources
The fifty stories, displayed on the site as clickable images with titles, are not only told through texts. Behind photos are interviews or podcasts, for example, and films and cartoons have also been made. One of the animation films, for example, shows all the trade union banners, which are in the archives of the IISH. “These are beautifully embroidered copies in which a lot of money was invested at the time. They are now stored away because they have long been replaced by catchy logos. But this way visitors to the site can still view them," says Van der Velden.
The archive, the professional literature and the memory of the historian himself form the sources for these trade union stories. “We had more stories to tell, but they also had to be visually well designed, of course. And these fifty stories succeeded in an informative and appealing way. I think a good example is the photo of the textile workers' strike from 1880 in Almelo. The leaders of the strikers had put on their neatest suits especially for the photographer. At that time, people rarely took pictures, so that was quite an event.” Unthinkable in our age of selfies.
Time is running out
When you create a site with stories, you have your favorites. For Van der Velden, that is the interview with union director Arie Groenevelt. “At the time we spoke to him, Arie was an old and fragile man. He also died shortly after. The contrast could not be greater with his union days. In the 1970s, the newspapers called this fierce activist 'the great danger of the Netherlands'. Despite his fragile condition, Arie was still passionate about his ideals of the time.”
In the sixties and seventies there was a lot of strikes and battles by the unions. The fact that the activists of that time are getting older was also a reason to quickly collect the stories while it was still possible. “Originally, we would have liked to do more interviews with former union leaders, but it turned out that many of them have already died.”
Another favorite is the quote from Reverend Hoedemaker, who described the railway strike in 1903 as an attempt by Satan to seize power:'The movement that seemed limited to Amsterdam must now or soon expand all over the world; it flows into the world republic. And that Republic becomes what it already is in essence, the one-headed government girded with Satanic power, turning, when the nations find not what they seek, against God and his anointed.” His sermon was to no avail…
Socially relevant?
The site does not only contain stories from the old box. There is also recent historical research behind it, which Van der Velden has conducted in recent years. He is one of the few in his field.
“Trade union history was not considered socially relevant for a long time, but that is now slowly changing. An important research question, for example, is why the number of members has been declining since the 1960s. Because society is becoming more and more individualistic? Because everything has already been achieved? There are many partial explanations, but a really conclusive explanation has not yet been found.”
In one of the podcasts, Van der Velden talks to two colleagues about this subject and how they are working with history as trade union historians. In any case, the project convinced him even more of the great richness of trade union history. “I've been studying this topic for a long time, but I'm still discovering new things. I continue to be amazed and that is special, isn't it?"