Vietnam: False Claims on Labor Rights
Human Rights Watch
| 2024.5.08
The
US Department of Commerce held a public hearing about Vietnam’s trade status on
May 8, 2024. The US government is currently considering a reclassification of
Vietnam under the US Tariff Law as a “market economy,” which would provide
Vietnam major economic benefits, even though Vietnam does not satisfy basic
labor rights standards. “It’s patently false to claim that Vietnamese workers can organize unions or that their wages are the result of free bargaining between labor and management,” said John Sifton, Asia advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “Not a single independent union exists in Vietnam and no working legal frameworks exist for unions to be created or for workers to enforce labor rights.” Human Rights Watch takes no position on Vietnam’s economic status, but the redesignation is legally contingent on basic labor rights protections and stated US policy on promoting labor rights. The US Congress should hold hearings on the topic and act to ensure that Vietnam’s record is properly reflected in the decision-making process. The European Union, which reached a free trade agreement with Vietnam in 2020, in part contingent on Vietnam’s pledges on labor rights, should initiate a review of its compliance. In determining whether to classify a country as a nonmarket economy, US law requires consideration of six factors, including how tightly its government controls natural resources, prices, currency exchanges, and other factors, including, “the extent to which wage rates in the foreign country are determined by free bargaining between labor and management.”
As
a matter of law and practice, Vietnam does not allow independent unions to
represent workers. Chapter 13 of Vietnam’s 2021 labor code provides for
“enterprise-level worker organizations,” and its Trade Union Law provides for
“trade unions” as well as “worker representative organizations,” a term that
appears in both laws. However, Vietnam’s Trade Union Law only allows
government-controlled “unions.” The labor code still requires implementing
regulations to be issued for the law to go into force. And no enterprise-level
worker representative organizations exist in Vietnam. At the same time, the Vietnam government continues to call the government-led Vietnam General Confederation of Labor (VGCL) a “labor confederation” of enterprise-level “labor federations.” But the VGCL is led by Vietnamese government appointees. The “unions” and “federations” that exist under the VGCL are almost led by people appointed by management at the enterprise level. Workers or labor leaders do not choose leaders or representatives who can bargain to set wages on their behalf. Insofar as the VGCL does bargain with management or at the state-wide level, it does so in the interests of the government and the Vietnamese Communist Party, not on behalf of workers and not in a representative capacity.
The
dynamic of state control of the VGCL has been further demonstrated by new
information about a recent directive issued by the Communist Party of Vietnam, “Directive
24,” which orders enhanced scrutiny of labor groups, civil society,
and foreign organizations, specifically in the context of Vietnam’s
implementation of new trade agreements with other countries and with the
International Labour Organization.
Multiple sources told Human Rights Watch that in late April, Vietnamese police
arrested Nguyen
Van Binh, a senior official in Vietnam’s labor ministry who had
advocated for more meaningful labor reforms and some independence of trade
unions.
“Vietnam is a closed society with an authoritarian government hostile to labor
rights,” Sifton said. “Workers cannot openly organize, let alone bargain with
management. The US government should recognize this.”
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