CROSS-BORDER SOCIAL DIALOGUE AND AGREEMENTS: An ...

Cross-border social dialogue and agreements
Discussion
The MLC negotiations show how, as capital globalizes, so do the
state forms needed to support it. Much of the pressure for global reregulation
of maritime shipping is arising from intensified class conflict, and
the need for a global industrial relations system to resolve it. Investigation
of the politics behind the MLC supports the contention that globalizing
States are not “retreating” (Strange, 1996), but neither are they
continuing as insular entities, “sovereign” in the traditional sense of the
word. Rather, States are “transforming” (Sorenson, 2004), as new forms
of governance emerge, based perhaps on templates from the interstate
system, but where this is the case, these forms of governance function in
new ways. Regulatory demands on institutions like the ILO increase, as
actors call on them to take on regulatory roles that nation States individually
no longer can fulfil.
In some respects, the MLC could be regarded as a reassertion of
long-abandoned state regulatory authority over maritime labour standards.
Despite the growth of private transnational industrial relations systems,
ILO agreements continue to be embedded in the formal structures
of an international system based on relations between sovereign States.
The formal institution of national sovereignty and the intergovernmental
global political framework are crucial to the MLC’s governance
system. The ILO made this clear when in the January 2004 MLC working
group an ILO legal expert stated in response to a question about
whether shipowners could violate the convention: “Member states adopt
this convention. Only member states can violate this convention. A
shipowner is not a member state. A shipowner cannot violate this convention.
But a shipowner can violate the standards set out in this convention”.
Clearly, the State retains importance as a central source of authority,
in that it continues to mediate and apply international agreements.
However, in a sense, the State’s role in the MLC is more as an intermediary
than a coherent interest. There was a low level of state autonomy in
formulating the MLC, and the implementation of the MLC’s “club” formation
strategy involves a high degree of interlinked sovereignties. The
degree to which States can in practice elect not to implement or enforce
the MLC will be very limited (assuming of course that enough flag States
ratify it for it to come into effect, and that enough port States ratify it to
ensure that there is a strong incentive to comply).
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