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

Cross-border social dialogue and agreements
IFAs and codes of conduct
The distinction between codes of conduct and IFAs is sometimes
ignored or blurred. For example, a list of IFAs established by the Friedrich
Ebert-Stiftung, in 2002, is called the “List of Codes of Conduct/Framework
Agreements”, as if they were interchangeable. A footnote says:
“Some GUFs call the agreements ‘Framework Agreements’, not Code of
Conduct, because there had been only a few principles fixed in the first
agreement which often have been extended by additional agreements. For
instance in the case of Danone the first agreement of 1988 has meanwhile
been developed by six other agreements”. This is, of course, not true. Neither
the IUF nor anyone else ever called the Danone agreement a code of
conduct, nor did anyone ever suggest that a code was in any sense
stronger than a framework agreement. A similar list, by SASK, the
Finnish trade union development agency, in 2005, is also headed Codes
of Conduct/Framework Agreements, with a similar footnote.
A positive article about IFAs in the IMF journal Metal World (Nilsson,
2002) introduces the subject by referring to IFAs “or Codes of Conduct,
as they were formerly called” and goes on to say that IFAs were
called codes of conduct “before that expression was compromised”. The
article later correctly points out some of the fundamental differences
between codes and IFAs, but the fact is that IFAs were never called codes
and that the concept of codes was compromised from the beginning as a
management-driven public relations exercise.
The ICFTU and some GUFs have developed “model codes of conduct”
as potential stepping stones to IFAs or for lack of a better alternative.
But some analysts have pointed out with reason, that:
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With this voluntary initiative by management to implement social policy
rules as business principles, weak unions and workers’ representatives will
tend to have little say in taking this further to a framework agreement that
commits both management and unions. There is reason to consider this a
barrier to adopting global agreements that commit both management and
unions, and thus a hinder for trade union recognition (Tørres and
Gunnes, 2003, p. 45).
On the subject, these authors also note:
Codes of conduct covering issues of social responsibility are becoming
more frequent. However, the extent to which this is facilitating improved
communications and dialogue between employees and management is
more doubtful. … There is … a danger that codes are seen as something