Swedish Unions revive recruitment efforts

White-collar organising

Snap-On in Bollnäs is a traditional industrial factory where workers directly involved in production constitute the majority of employees. A bit further south, about an hour's drive from Stockholm is ABB, one of the world's leading high-tech companies and one which is increasingly dominated by white-collar workers and engineers.

Of the 3,500 white-collar workers, 1,300 are organized in Unionen (a merger of the industrial employees' union Sif and the commercial employees' union HTF). When the government made the unemployment funds more expensive, Unionen lost members.

"Many older members left," recalls Krista Loiske, Unionen's branch chairman for ABB in Västerås. "They thought their jobs were secure and that they could afford to be outside the union."

"It has become increasingly difficult to recruit," Krista says. "It used to go without saying that people would stick up for each other. But society has been getting more and more individualized, and we are often confronted with the question: 'Why should I join, what do I stand to gain from the union?'"

Last autumn the crisis came. And that was when many people's attitude toward the union changed, says Krista.

"The loss of members stopped, and more people began to join. It was as if the crisis served as a warning that people have to stick together. Which is really the whole point of the union."

That is precisely the point that Unionen's activists constantly try to make when they meet newly hired people, when they report on their activity, when they offer coffee and show themselves among the employees.

The effect of the crisis in reversing the downward trend of membership figures has also been seen at the national level in Unionen. From September to October 2008 the number of members began to rise.