Year in Reflection by Kriangsak Teerakowitkajorn

In our 4th contribution in the Year in Reflection series, we asked Kriangsak Teerakowitkajorn at Just Economy and Labor Institute (JELI) in Thailand, who authored “Which Side Are You On?” Thailand’s anti-authoritarian youth challenge to the labour movement, what issues we should be more attentive to.


What is one thing that is not given enough attention?

I believe we are not paying enough attention to questions of power and strategy.

My main work uses research as stepping stones to strengthen organizing and campaign for several groups of gig workers. I realize that researchers including myself may not necessarily engage with the questions of collective power: what kinds of power different groups of workers (already) have and from where they could draw more power.

Having observed activists and workers taking actions over the years, I am puzzled why they rarely discuss these questions, let alone think explicitly about winning strategies or how to win. I often ask myself how our research would help strengthen emerging workers’ collectives, with the potential to become a movement.

For those working at the juncture of authoritarianism and corporate hegemony, powerful trade unions are an exception rather than a norm. This context is vastly different from the post-industrial experiences, for which the Western vantage point has shaped literature.

For these reasons, we need more insights and shared wisdom from workers, activists, and researchers from the Global South.

Any important insight you have gained this year?

For some time, researchers have begun to ask what workplace means for gig workers such as couriers, or on-demand masseuses. This is a key question with myriad implications on workers’ organizing tactics and power structure.

Having followed gig workers’ organizing activities, I realized that workers are going far beyond traditional workplaces when it comes to finding central issues to unite rank and file. Their self-organization is driven primarily by everyday problems, from road safety to daily interaction with abusive customers. Trade unions in relevant sectors seem to grapple with such challenges and struggle to support the cause.

As a whole, platformization leads to changes that prompt rethinking what we take for granted. Inevitably, dominant labor institutions such as the International Labour Organization (ILO), or even the industrial relations system, are losing their legitimacy and relevance.

It sounds like we are in some sorts of crisis, but this crisis is not necessarily bad for the future of labor. These institutions, organizations and frameworks are no longer effective, or one may claim, were never built for making labor strong in the first place.

The question is, hence, how labor could build power to scrap these remnants and rebuild new ones that serve labor the best.

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I don’t think the title of your article matches the content lol. Just kidding, mainly because I had some doubts after reading the article.